Consumer ethics and animal welfare issues: changing the “human landscape”

By now we have celebrated several UNICART birthdays, we have gone through the COVID-19 pandemic, which we hope we have left behind (we'll see...), and we have fallen into a war conflict of which we still don't know how to see an evolution towards peace. Our whole world rebels against this war, which only makes the whole environment worse; the scientific community does what it can to try to support our essence: GAIA Gaia who wants to defend herself, Gaia who rebels, Gaia who wants to be reborn. Like all myths, GAIA will make itself felt, first in a terrible way, then, as a mother, she will welcome us back into her bosom to lead us back into the infinity of the cosmos. For this anniversary, IARC-USC presents a book from our editorial series containing a multidisciplinary selection (carried out by the IARC Scientific Committee with the precious contribution of some peer reviewers) of essays that were presented at the UNICART International Conferences during the year 2021 and which participated in the Best Paper Award in 2022. The book is divided into 2 sections: 1. the first collects essays from senior researchers, who are the commanders of the ships of culture and scientific research, those who are able to lead our students into the turbulent sea of knowledge; 2. the second collects the papers from junior researchers, because UNICART believes and invests in young talents who represent our future. Peer review procedures guarantee good levels of interest and quality of published works, as well as scientific innovation in various research fields. About half of the essays initially selected did not completely convince the reviewers, but we can state that the papers that survived the severe selection present, each in its own scientific branch, undoubted aspects of innovation and interest. Our hope is that this experience will continue for a long time, against any problem such as pandemic, war or other, and this happens because after every storm the sun comes back, and the rain gives way to the rainbow. The various essays in this book deal with different topics with different methods and approaches, but they are all integrated into the main topics that represent the only common thread (now essential) of UNICART: GAIA.