Wastewater sludge byproduct shows promise and risks for sustainable agriculture
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 30-Dec-2025 20:11 ET (31-Dec-2025 01:11 GMT/UTC)
China has moved from patchy, post-crisis biosafety rules to a unified legal regime anchored by the 2020 Biosecurity Law, yet fragmentation, weak risk intelligence and poor inter-agency coordination still leave gaps that could be exploited by novel pathogens, synthetic biology or geopolitical tension. Historical review shows three phases: 1949-2002 built basic disease reporting and plant-quarantine systems but relied on paper records; 2003-2019 introduced internet-based surveillance, BSL-3/4 laboratories and alignment with WHO’s International Health Regulations after the SARS shock; 2020-present elevated biosafety to national-security status, enacted the Biosecurity Law and poured funds into diagnostics, vaccines and bio-economic R&D during COVID-19. These steps created the skeleton of a modern system, but four structural weaknesses persist: strategic plans lack operational road-maps and AI-enabled foresight; the legal framework offers no clear dispute-resolution or accountability mechanisms; organisational silos among health, agriculture, science and military agencies hamper horizontal coordination; and public awareness plus professional training remain patchy, weakening compliance culture.
Following the path towards innovation in education and health, the Department of Education and Specific Didactics of the Universitat Jaume I is developing Hort4Health. Under the direction of Mireia Adelantado Renau, lecturer in the Department of Didactics of Experimental Sciences, this leading project seeks to analyse and investigate in an interdisciplinary way the impact of integrating an eco-educational garden in the classrooms where students learn about health, sustainability and emotional well-being, thus offering a solid scientific basis on the benefits of these practices.
The Hort4Health project emerges in response to the growing need to promote healthy habits among young people, especially in an era where technology and sedentary lifestyles predominate and generate worrying figures. Through practical activities in the garden, students not only study about agriculture and ecology, but also experience the benefits of physical activity and contact with nature for their mental and physical health. Researcher Mireia Adelantado points out that in this way "scientific results will be obtained on the current healthy habits of the university community, completing the scarce previous literature on this subject in this population". This initiative has already involved more than a hundred pupils from the Early Childhood and Primary School Teacher degrees, who have participated in sessions designed to improve their emotional wellbeing, their connection with the environment and their understanding of the importance of an active and healthy life. Early results indicate a significant positive impact on the physical health of the participants and underline the potential of the garden as an innovative space for learning and wellbeing.