Profile
Valentina is a business economist by training who has been involved in the sustainability field for a decade. In particular, her research has focused on (1) sustainability transitions towards the circular economy covering: (i) innovation processes across various industries - e.g. waste management, bio-based industry (bioplastics), food industry, green chemistry, forestry, aquaculture industry; (ii) sustainable circular business strategies at firm level; (iii) social – LCA regarding bio-based products; (iv) policy mixes for innovation and sustainable transitions, (v) social acceptance of bio-based products, etc; (2) capacity building for reducing plastic pollution and plastic prevention – working closely with stakeholders from various industries (e.g. plastic packaging, recycling, food and beverages), local environmental agencies, NGOs, local research institutions and industry associations; (3) socio-economic sustainability assessment of innovative plastics business models - e.g. replacement of single-use plastic products, plastic- free cities and tourist attractions, sustainable use of plastics in agriculture, circular economy business models tackling plastic pollution, best environmental practices (BET) for plastic waste reduction, etc; (4) modelling approaches for predicting socio-environmental evolution in highly anthropized coastal lagoons. In her research work, she is making use of both quantitative methods – e.g. cost- benefit analysis, social network analysis, system dynamics modelling, dynamic actor network analysis, agent-based modelling, multi-criteria decision analysis, risk analysis; and qualitative participatory methods- e.g. workshops, focus groups, Delphi surveys, group model‐building techniques, etc. She has been involved in several international research projects, COST Action TD1203 (EUBIS), Bioeconomy in Transition Research Group (BiT), ISWA Young Professionals Group. Between Nov. 2017 and Oct. 2019, she also held the project manager role of STAR-ProBio - a H2020 research project aiming at developing sustainability assessment tools for bio-based products.