Periurban agrifood systems as high-priority sustainability challenges

New and distinct perspectives are urgently needed to understand periurban agrifood systems as high priority sustainability challenges. The rationale for our Perspective is rooted in viewing these sustainability challenges as powerfully shaped through the widespread global expansion and accelerating uneven development of periurban areas. Our Perspective uses this distinct focus on periurban agrifood systems to address a select group of current sustainability challenges and dynamics: (1) dynamics of multifunctional trends in changing periurban agrifood systems; (2) health and well-being including food and nutrition; (3) climate change, land use, and land systems that include a gamut of types encompassing agriculture, gardening, and other food-related functions; (4) agroecosystem and agroecological processes including diverse food (i.e., agrobiodiversity, soil, water) and (5) landscape dynamics and connectivity. Scope of the sustainability analysis is guided by our in-of-for framework of ideas emphasizing the multifunctionality of periurban agrifood systems, spatial dimensions, and research-policy-stakeholder connections. Further distinctness is evidenced in our Perspective’s framing in relation to global periurban expansion and accelerating uneven development. Our Perspective elucidates key insights of research on the current challenges of periurban agrifood sustainability. By developing, applying, and reflecting on its well-defined, coherent position centered on these elements, the distinct viewpoint of our Perspective provides important advances and insights toward the understanding of periurban agrifood systems and sustainability challenges.