Nutritional and Health Aspects of Food in the Balkans

Dr. Dipl. Eng. Alina-Ioana Gostin, originally from Romania, is a lecturer at College of Food, University College Birmingham, UK, teaching in the areas of Food Science and Technology, Food Safety, Diet and Nutrition. Dr Gostin’s research interests focus on technologies that improve quality and safety of foods. She is also the director of the Ambassador Programme of the Global Harmonization Initiative (GHI).

Diana is an interdisciplinary researcher with varied interests in food consumption issues related to the global consequences of human nutritional habits, especially global meat consumption, alternative proteins, novel food processing technologies including non-thermal, behavioural and attitudinal change, environmental sustainability and food harmonization. She has a PhD in Humanities specialised in Food Sustainability from Curtin University, Perth, Australia. Currently she is a Centre Manager of the Centre for Advanced Food Engineering at the University of Sydney and Research Fellow with Curtin University’s Sustainability Policy (CUSP) Institute. Diana’s books have won three awards: the Australian National Best Book winner in 2019 and the World’s Best Book award 2020 in the Vegetarian book category from the Gourmand Awards, who also recognized her co-edited book ‘Environmental, Health and Business Opportunities in the New Meat Alternatives Market’.

Dr. Vladimir Kakurinov is a Full Professor in Food Microbiology and Food Quality and Safety. He worked at the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Food, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University and the Veterinary Medicine Faculty at St. Kliment Ohridski University, both in Republic of Macedonia. Now, he is founder and Executive Director of Consulting and Training Centre KEY dealing with international projects.