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Food waste (FW) is a critical challenge in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). This paper analyzes research dealing with food waste in the GCC countries (viz. Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates). It draws upon a systematic review performed on Scopus in January 2020. The paper covers both bibliometrics (e.g., authors, affiliations, journals) and research topics (e.g., causes, food supply chain stages, extent and quantity, food security, economic impacts, environmental implications, management strategies). A main finding of the review is the scarcity of data on FW in the GCC in general and in Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain in particular. Most of the selected articles address FW reuse and recycling (e.g., waste-to-energy conversion, compost production). Indeed, other FW management strategies, such as reduction/prevention and redistribution, are overlooked. The systematic review highlights that further research on FW in the GCC is highly needed with a focus on the identified research gaps such as causes and drivers, trends, magnitude and extent, environmental and economic impacts, along with implications of food wastage in terms of food security. Since food wastage is a common issue for all GCC countries, these research gaps should be addressed in a shared regional research agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to study the perceptions of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on behaviors related to diet and food shopping on a sample of 356 adults in Oman. The study is based on the results of an Arabic-language online survey conducted between September 15 and October 10, 2020, using the Survey Monkey platform. The questionnaire had 25 questions (multiple options and one option), subdivided into three parts. Respondents were asked to disseminate the survey to their networks as part of the study's snowball sampling method. Descriptive statistics and various statistical tests (e.g., U-Mann Whitney, Kruskal-Wallis, chi-square) have been used to evaluate the study results. The study showed a significant shift in the attitude and behavior of respondents regarding food and health. Indeed, the paper findings indicated (i) a shift to healthier diets, as shown by the fact that 45.5% of the participants increased their intake of fruits and vegetables, 42.4% ate more healthy foods, and 53.1% reduced their intake of unhealthy foods; (ii) an increase in the consumption of local products, owing to food safety concerns, with 25.8% of the cohort stating that they purchase more local food items; (iii) a shift in grocery shopping behaviors, especially with 28.1% of the participants buying more groceries online; (iv) the absence of panic buying in Oman, since 62.36% of the participants said they did not stockpile food items; and (v) a reduction of food waste. Indeed, 78.9% of the participants specified they were not wasting more food than average since the beginning of the pandemic, and 74.72% indicated they were more aware of how much food they were wasting. Surprisingly, COVID-19 appears to bring many beneficial adjustments in Oman to make food consumption more sustainable and healthier., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Ben Hassen, El Bilali, Allahyari, Al Samman and Marzban.)