Food Waste
3️⃣ amazing startups are reducing food waste in their own ways
Every week, I cover 3 startups across the world that wouldn’t have been founded if the founders said ‘🤷🏽♂️ Not My Problem’.
If food waste was a country, it’d be the #3 global greenhouse gas emitter- UN
Had Jane Kou, Fotis Fotiadis & Miha Pipan and Rayner Loi & Keshav Sivakumar dismissed Food Waste as someone else’s problem, these 3 companies would never have been founded-
🍲Connecting people to delicious unsold meals
That’s perfectly edible... Annually, around one-third of the food produced globally for human consumption is wasted. This includes large quantities of edible food thrown away by eating establishments at the end of the day.
Making unsold food accessible...Bring Me Home is connecting these establishments (restaurants & cafes) in 3 provinces of Australia with customers that are ready to purchase this food at a discounted price. If unsold, this food is thrown out into landfills, where it can’t compost properly.
Win-Win-Win...Landfills produce methane, a greenhouse gas that is 20x more potent than CO2(so less food waste ➡️ lower environmental impact); customers get to purchase edible food at a discounted rate and retailers earn extra revenue.
🐔Turning local food waste into animal feed
Poultry farmers love soy... Chickens are mostly fed a grain and soy-rich diet (reason- elevated levels of protein). The high soy demand by poultry farmers in countries like the UK is causing farmers in Brazil to destroy forests to produce more soy.
Producing animal feed without deforestation... A great alternative to a soy-rich diet is insects- rich in protein, can be sourced locally and the birds love it! Feeding live insects also encourage hens to carry out natural foraging behaviour (less inclined to peck other birds).
Farm-to-fork model(for the chickens)...Better Origin is growing larvae using food waste in shipping containers. Instead of ending in landfills, food and crop waste are dumped in the container and maggot eggs are introduced. Within 2 weeks, they decompose the food, grow into larvae and are ready to be fed to the chickens- creating a circular food system.
🗑️Tracking food waste in your kitchen
If you can’t measure, you can’t reduce…Commercial kitchens(think hotels, airlines) throw away heaps of unconsumed food(semi-prepared or cooked meals) every day. A lot of them donate it to food banks but not many make an effort to reduce the wastage(by effectively measuring it).
Get Insight into your waste...Lumitics food waste tracker allows kitchen staff in these commercial kitchens to effectively measure their food waste. Installed in the kitchen dustbin, the tracker measures the quantity and contents(using a 📷 and AI) of the waste before it is disposed of.
Becoming part of the process…Commercial kitchens are busy spaces. Lumitics’ plug-n-play model seamlessly integrates with the kitchen workflow and provides chefs with actionable insights(waste generated, customer and seasonal trends) that helps them minimize food waste.
☑️ Our weekly tips
Plan your meals- To avoid shopping for products that you will not consume and eventually throw away.
Ugly delicious- Choose those ‘not so perfect’ looking fruits and vegetables that are edible but others won’t buy.
Has it really expired?- Learn how to interpret food product dating.
💡Do you practice something at your home or workplace to reduce food waste? Just hit reply and let us know. We’ll feature it in the next edition
📹 Epic conversations
Watch my conversations with founders tackling food waste in Canada
Goldilocks Wraps- An eco-friendly alternative to plastic wraps, these compostable wraps keep food fresh for a longer duration and help in reducing food waste.
Fresh City Farms- A hyperlocal grocery company that controls the entire supply chain from growing the produce to delivering the final products.
Nature Knows- A proprietary packaging technology keeps the fruits and vegetables fresh for a longer time and helps to reduce food wastage.
Feedback and suggestions are always welcome🙂 . Also, if you know any other startups across the world that are tackling the problem of food waste, do let us know 📥