Social Innovation and Sustainability in Agri-Food Systems

Applicants are invited for a PhD fellowship/scholarship at Graduate School of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark, within the Agroecology programme. The position is available from 1 December 2026 or later. You can submit your application via the link under 'how to apply'.

 

Title:
Social Innovation and Sustainability in Agri-Food Systems

Research area and project description:
Applicants are invited for a PhD fellowship/scholarship at Graduate School of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark, within the Agroecology programme. The position is available from 1 December 2026 or later. You can submit your application via the link under 'how to apply.

Positive animal welfare is increasingly recognized as a cornerstone of sustainable and socially legitimate agri-food systems, yet perspectives on what constitutes good animal welfare and how it should be comunicaated across the value-chain and balanced with other sustainability concerns remain highly contested. The PhD project will investigate how farmers, consumers and value-chain actors understand and value positive animal welfare characteristics in organic broiler production systems, and how these perspectives interact with broader sustainability concerns. The position is situated at the intersection of agri-food systems research, agroecology, sustainability transitions, and mixed-methods social science.

Societal expectations towards livestock production are changing rapidly. In addition to concerns about minimizing negative welfare states, increasing attention is being directed towards positive animal welfare, including animals’ opportunities for natural behaviour, exploration, social interaction, comfort, and positive affective experiences. At the same time, animal welfare is increasingly discussed alongside other sustainability dimensions such as climate impact, biodiversity, food affordability, and rural development. Understanding how consumers, producers and the broader agri-food system navigate these interconnected concerns is essential for supporting socially robust and sustainable transitions of agri-food systems. The PhD position contributes to the WELL-B and Anivers projects.

This PhD is situated within a research team with an exciting international and interdisciplinary research environment and industrial collaborators. We seek a highly motivated PhD student who will explore the configuration of the agri-food system as a basis for care and improving the delivery of ecosystem services. 

The PhD project more specifically should aim to investigate the socio-cultural foundations of positive animal welfare characteristics of organic livestock systems. Specifically:

• Apply a mixed methods research approach to examine how actors across the organic broiler value chain, from producers, processors and retailers to consumers’ perceive, negotiate, and potentially innovate around positive animal welfare and sustainability trade-offs.
• Based on a social innovations and food systems perspective, analyze how consumption practices, valuation, knowledge regimes and agro-food transitions to understand how animal welfare becomes meaningful and provide leveragepoints for agri-food system tranformation.
• Organize mixed method research combining a national survey and focus groups to assess how positive animal welfare is negotiated in a value chain perspective.
• Contribute to developing a mixed-methods research design that could include including surveys, focus groups, visual elicitation, consumer diaries, sensory ethnography and short-term ethnographic
   
• Project description. For technical reasons, you must upload a project description. Please simply copy the project description above and upload it as a PDF in the application.

Qualifications and specific competences:
Applicants to the PhD position must have a relevant Master’s degree (or graduate in the very near future – documentation for final thesis and date of examination must be enclosed in the application) or equivalent. The applicants shall preferably have a social science background, for instance sociology, anthropology, geography or political science with a focus on, or knowledge of, agriculture and food production.

Place of employment and place of work:
The place of employment is Aarhus University, and the place of work is AU Viborg, Blichers Allé 20, 8830 Tjele, Denmark. 

Contacts:
Applicants seeking further information regarding the PhD position are invited to contact: 

• Associate Professor Martin Hvarregaard Thorsøe, Martinh.thorsoe@agro.au.dk (main supervisor)

For information about application requirements and mandatory attachments, please see our application guide. If answers cannot be found there, please contact:

• admission.gradschool.tech@au.dk 

How to apply:
Please follow this link to submit your application. 

Application deadline is 15 August 2026 23:59 CEST. 

Preferred starting date is 1 December 2026.

Please note: 

• Only documents received prior to the application deadline will be evaluated. Thus, documents sent after deadline will not be taken into account.
• The programme committee may request further information or invite the applicant to attend an interview.
• Shortlisting will be used, which means that the evaluation committee only will evaluate the most relevant applications.

Aarhus University’s ambition is to be an attractive and inspiring workplace for all and to foster a culture in which each individual has opportunities to thrive, achieve and develop. We view equality and diversity as assets, and we welcome all applicants. All interested candidates are encouraged to apply, regardless of their personal background. Salary and terms of employment are in accordance with applicable collective agreement.