With the increasing urbanization but growing resource scarcities, the securing provision of fundamental resources as food, energy and water (FEW) has become a unique challenge for urban sustainability. This is not only because of continuous demand of resource imports from different regions for urban areas, but also due to the complex interrelationships among FEW systems. In such context, exploring the interactions between FEW resources and economic activities when investigating FEW provisions to meet urban demand through trade is very essential to find effective policy intervention points and priority areas for actions. This paper investigates external binding FEW resource flows with internal certain interlinkages driven by final demand of Beijing city at different nodes along their supply chains, by combing structural path analysis and multi-regional input-output model of China 2010. The results show that the key source regions present overall neighborhood pattern that Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Anhui, Jiangsu, and Shandong near Beijing are the five leading contributors of tran-regional FEW provisions. The top 20 nexus paths are identified and the most important nexus pathways start with the other services in Beijing. Besides this, the critical supply chains appear divergent directions for FEW flows, driven by food, construction and agriculture industries respectively. Moreover, the key nodes mainly concentrate on less developed regions and energy-related sectors. For example, non-metal products manufacturing in Hebei, petroleum refining and coking in Heilongjiang, and coal mining and washing in Inner Mongolia have larger impacts on all of FEW flows across the supply chains. These results are very informative to targeting our efforts to address the urban FEW nexus issue both from the perspective of supply side and demand side.

Treatment of fresh fruits and vegetables with electrolyzed water (EW) has been shown to kill or reduce foodborne pathogens. We evaluated the efficacy of EW in killing Escherichia coli O157:H7 on iceberg lettuce, cabbage, lemons, and tomatoes by using washing and/or chilling treatments simulating those followed in some food service kitchens. Greatest reduction levels on lettuce were achieved by sequentially washing with 14-A (amperage) acidic EW (AcEW) for 15 or 30 s followed by chilling in 16-A AcEW for 15 min. This procedure reduced the pathogen by 2.8 and 3.0 log CFU per leaf, respectively, whereas washing and chilling with tap water reduced the pathogen by 1.9 and 2.4 log CFU per leaf. Washing cabbage leaves for 15 or 30 s with tap water or 14-A AcEW reduced the pathogen by 2.0 and 3.0 log CFU per leaf and 2.5 to 3.0 log CFU per leaf, respectively. The pathogen was reduced by 4.7 log CFU per lemon by washing with 14-A AcEW and 4.1 and 4.5 log CFU per lemon by washing with tap water for 15 or 30 s. A reduction of 5.3 log CFU per lemon was achieved by washing with 14-A alkaline EW for 15 s prior to washing with 14-A AcEW for 15 s. Washing tomatoes with tap water or 14-A AcEW for 15 s reduced the pathogen by 6.4 and 7.9 log CFU per tomato, respectively. Application of AcEW using procedures mimicking food service operations should help minimize cross-contamination and reduce the risk of E. coli O157:H7 being present on produce at the time of consumption.

Water from La Pampa, Argentina, was used for washing and cooking rice to examine the in-situ impact of using naturally-contaminated water for food preparation on the elemental dietary intake. Whilst washing with the control tap water (28 μg/L As) reduced the concentration of As in rice by 23%, the use of different well waters (281–1144 μg/L) increased As levels significantly (48–227%) in comparison with the original concentration in the rice (0.056 µg/g). Cooking the rice at a low water-to-rice ratio (2:1) using modern methods increased the levels of As in the cooked samples by 2–3 orders of magnitude for both pre-washed and un-washed rice. Similar trends were observed for vanadium. Although the levels of manganese, iron, copper, zinc and molybdenum in rice were reduced during washing and cooking for most water samples, the molybdenum concentration in the cooked rice doubled (2.2–2.9 µg/g) when using water containing >1 mg/L Mo.

Biofilm formation on food contact surfaces is a potential hazard leading to cross-contamination during food processing. We investigated Listeria innocua biofilm formation on various food contact surfaces and compared the washing effect of slightly acidic electrolyzed water (SAEW) at 30, 50, 70, and 120 ppm with that of 200 ppm of sodium hypochlorite (NaClO) on biofilm cells. The risk of L. innocua biofilm transfer and growth on food at retail markets was also investigated. The viability of biofilms that formed on food contact surfaces and then transferred cells to duck meat was confirmed by fluorescence microscopy. L. innocua biofilm formation was greatest on rubber, followed by polypropylene, glass, and stainless steel. Regardless of sanitizer type, washing removed biofilms from polypropylene and stainless steel better than from rubber and glass. Among the various SAEW concentrations, washing with 70 ppm of SAEW for 5 min significantly reduced L. innocua biofilms on food contact surfaces during food processing. Efficiency of transfer of L. innocua biofilm cells was the highest on polypropylene and lowest on stainless steel. The transferred biofilm cells grew to the maximum population density, and the lag time of transferred biofilm cells was longer than that of planktonic cells. The biofilm cells that transferred to duck meat coexisted with live, injured, and dead cells, which indicates that effective washing is essential to remove biofilm on food contact surfaces during food processing to reduce the risk of foodborne disease outbreaks.

The major landslide of 2010 in Bududa district in Eastern Uganda is the most catastrophic natural disaster in Uganda's recorded history. An estimated 350 people died and some of the affected were resettled in Kiryandongo district. We assessed housing, water and sanitation practises of affected households and controls to establish possible implications on food insecurity and diet diversity.This cross-sectional study assessed 1078 affected and control households in Bududa and Kiryandongo districts. The head of the households were either affected, selected from landslide disaster-affected communities, or controls from a random sub-county bordering the affected. Structured interviews were used and entries were tested statistically to report crude estimates based on the Pearson x² and ANOVA, while adjusted analysis used multivariate analysis of co-variance (MANCOVA) and Wald's Odds Ratio (OR) of Binary Logistic Regression at the 95% CI.On adjusting for the disaster and covariates, households who had insufficient access to water scored higher mean (SE) on food insecurity than those who reported sufficient access: 13.1 (0.4) vs. 9.5 (0.3) (P < 0.01). Intriguingly, households who owned a toilet and those who reported always using soap to wash hands scored higher food insecurity than their counterparts: 11.1 (0.3) vs. 9.0 (0.6) (P < 0.01) and 11.3 (0.3) vs. 9.1 (0.5) (P < 0.01), respectively. However, not owning a toilet increased the likelihood of being food insecure (OR 3.43; 95% CI 1.31, 8.97; P = 0.02). In Kiryandongo, affected households scored higher food insecurity than controls: 9.5 (0.5) vs. 5.4 (0.5) (P < 0.01) and higher diet diversity scores (DDS): 6.7 (0.2) vs. 6.2 (0.2) (P = 0.04). Type of housing also predicted food insecurity (P < 0.01) and DDS (P = 0.03). Like Bududa, households with insufficient water access scored higher food insecurity while those owning toilet scored higher DDS. Uniquely, only number of rooms was linked to a high likelihood of being food insecure (OR 1.60; 95% CI 1.19, 2.15; P < 0.05).Disaster, food security and diet were sensitive to housing, water and sanitation and were integral to an adequate standard of living of victims of this landslide.