Every year, an amount of 1.3 billion tonnes of food is either lost or wasted globally (Lemos, 2019). From this amount, 88 million tonnes of food is lost in Europe (Condamine, 2020). To get a better understanding of this number, 1.3 billion tonnes of food is around one-third of all food (Lemos, 2019). Therefore, food waste is a serious issue. Food waste happens at every stage in the supply chain, namely at farms, shops, restaurants and at households. To reduce food waste in these stages, innovative ways should be used (Mouysset, 2019). One of the many ways that can help reduce the food waste, is by using different types of technology. But what type of technology could be used to solve this problem?
First of all, there are many innovative ways found by companies, using technology, that can help reduce food waste at farms. Two examples of tech companies that are trying to help farmers are Full Harvest and Plantix. Full Harvest has built the first B2B marketplace where farmers and food companies can connect. Here, the food companies can buy food from the farmers that are not perfectly grown or food that they cannot get rid of (Mouysset, 2019). The food companies that buy food on this marketplace, can get it up to 40% cheaper compared to if they would buy it from traditional distributors (Lemos, 2019). The second company, Plantix, uses the technology Artificial Intelligence (AI) to help farmers (Lemos, 2019). They have launched an application that helps the farmers to be more productive. Farmers can upload images of their plants in this application. Then, the application can help recognize plant diseases and pests on time. This will avoid the plant diseases and pests from affecting the health of a plant, which can lead to food waste (Lemos, 2019).
Next to technology used for farmers, there are also technologies used to decrease the food waste in restaurants. One famous example that is really successful in decreasing food waste in this industry, is the company Too Good To Go. In this application, restaurants and cafes can sell food that they did not sell at the end of the day for a relatively low price (Mouysset, 2019). This application has two large advantages. First of all, it will avoid the food from being wasted and second, new consumers for these restaurants and cafes are attracted (Mouysset, 2019).
In this blog post, just a few examples are given of technologies that can help reduce food waste globally. However, next to theexamples given, many more companies are looking into opportunities on how to tackle this issue. If everyone helps in reducing the food waste problem, talking about consumers, businesses, farmers and governments (Mouysset, 2019), I believe that we should be able to decrease the 1.3 billion tonnes of food that is wasted every year.
References
Condamine, P. (2020). The severity of food waste in Europe. Retrieved 6 October 2020, from https://www.neweurope.eu/article/the-severity-of-food-waste-in-europe/
Lemos, L. (2019). Innovative technologies to help you cut food waste in 2020. Retrieved 6 October 2020, from https://digitalagenda.io/insight/innovative-technologies-food-waste/
Mouysset, C. (2019). 15 Emerging Technologies Helping Reduce Food Waste. Retrieved 6 October 2020, from https://www.lightspeedhq.com/blog/food-waste-emerging-technologies/
Dear Valerie,
Thank you for this very insightful article. I am very interested in sustainability and I think it is very interesting to see how sustainability and technology work together. I also believe the university could leverage on technology and also offer ways for waste to be reduced. The university garden can also be used in order to provide some locally grown products to eat, which could also reduce waste. I think one of the main challenges with these kind of technology is attracting sufficient amount of people in order to create network effects. In fact, application such as Too Good To go would be more attractive for more people to use as a broader choice would be available. Some kind if incentives should be creates for shops and restaurants to instaure these kind of technologies.
Dear Amandine,
Thank you very much for reading my article. It is nice to hear that you are also interested in the topic of sustainability, combined with technology. I totally agree that universities could also play a vital role in reducing food waste and could definitely look into possibilities. It is definitely true that network effects are important for these types of applications. However, I believe that Too Good To Go already offers many choices and is also one of the reasons why they are so successful. But of course, I agree that it would be even more successful if the range would be even broader than it is right now.
Thank you for the new insight!
Dear Valerie,
Thank you very much for your post.
Even though food waste is a well known subject, it is still shocking to see the numbers you have mentionned at the beginning of your post. I think they put really well into place the challenge we are facing. It will be key in mankind’s development.
As well, the three examples you have used (Full Harvest, Plantix, Too Good to Go) are great solutions into overcoming part of the current waste problem. However, I do believe that you could have only picked one or two examples and go deeper in their business models.
All in all, it is a really well written and interesting blogpost, good job!
Dear Eliot,
Thank you very much for reading my post and for the feedback.
The reason behind my blog post was to make everyone aware of the large number of food that is wasted every year for which I believe that it could be a smaller number, especially in these times in which there are many (technological) possibilities. To make everyone aware of the many possibilities, I chose to instead of going deep into one or two business models, to show everyone that there are already many technological possibilities to overcome this challenge.
But ofcourse, I agree that I could have elaborated more on the examples that I gave. It is nice to hear that you would have been interested in hearing more about these examples and that it opens your eyes on how large the numbers are.
Thanks!
Hi Valerie,
Thank you for sharing this interesting article.
As sustainability is a very trending topic these past few years, I believe more people should know about this concept. Too Good To Go for example, is a really nice way for consumers to get the leftovers for a reasonable price (especially for students!). Still, in my opinion, not enough people know about this app and the benefits it has.
Though, I am really wondering if the food excess should instead go to people in need of it. Wouldn’t it be nice if Too Good To Go had a collaboration with food banks, so the leftovers could go there instead?
I would love to hear your opinion about this.
Hi Lisa,
Thank you for reading my blog post.
I totally agree that people should be more aware of the concept food waste. Ofcourse, there are already many people that know about it, but this number can always be increased.
Thank you for sharing this insight. I totally agree that it would be interesting if the food excess can go to the people in need of it. However, did you know that if you use this application, that you can donate an amount of approximately 3/4 euros to the “Voedselbank”? Therefore, Too Good To Go is already working with food banks however, I definitely agree that this collaboration could be extended by also donating them the excess food of restaurants and cafes.
Hi Valerie, it was very interesting to read your blog about how to prevent food waste! It is crazy to think every year 1.3 billion tonnes of food is lost or wasted, therefore being an issue that needs to be tackled. It is good that different type of stakeholders are helping each other to prevent food waste such as restaurants and consumers (Too Good To Go) and farmers and food companies (Full Harvest). I believe it has even a bigger growing potential as it could benefit from network effects. The more parties are using the platform, the more people can benefit from the food on it and prevent food waste.
Moreover, not only parties in the beginning of the supply chain, also the end-consumers are responsible for a large part of the food waste as a lot of food is being thrown away at home. Although companies are trying to reduce their food waste, we should also start with ourself how we can contribute to this. There are currently certain apps, where you can track what food you have in your fridge. Moreover, Samsung introduced a Fridgecam, letting you look in your fridge from wherever. I think with the advanced in technology there could even more possibilities to tackle this problem at home!
Hi Daphne,
Thank you for reading my blog post. Yes, right? I knew that this problem existed but I did not have a clue before reading on this topic that the amount is this large. I totally agree that network effects are really important for these platforms to work well.
It is an interesting insight that you share about the end-consumers. I did not read about this stage in the supply chain yet, but this is definitely interesting as well because this could tackle the problem of food waste as well. I agree with you that advances in technology in the future could help to reduce food waste, both at the people’s home as well as in the rest of the stages of the supply chain. Let’s hope that the number of food wasted every year will be decreased!