A New Food Economy

?Food wastage is a supply chain problem. In simple words, we are not able to store, transport, process, sell and consume food as efficiently as we should. But even this problem faces disparity throughout the world. In our previous blog we looked at how different regions of the world contribute to food wastage in different stages of the supply chain. To solve the problem at its root requires a mix of infrastructure development, policy-making and change in consumer behaviour. This is a slow, ongoing process and naturally so, in a rapidly changing world economy.

The faster and more sustainable solution is recycling.

At present, India is one of the largest producers of animal feed in the world. The INR 874 billion market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 12.5%. And yet, the industry suffers from quality nutritional produce. This is an opportunity. Connect the dots backwards and we have an ingenious solution - converting commercial food waste to animal feed.

A win-win solution

Disposing of food waste not only costs money to food companies, it also directly contributes to global warming through carbon emissions. By converting food waste to animal feed, we automatically tackle both problems. In fact, instead of spending money, food companies earn money on their waste. What was once expenditure, now becomes revenue.

●??????High nutrition agricultural produce naturally goes first for human consumption, while secondary produce is used to make animal feed. By upcycling food waste & food by-products, we can plug this gap and produce high nutrition animal feed.

●??????Converting food waste to feed also reduces the impact on land. Reusing existing produce (marked for waste) to make animal feed helps to avoid additional conversion of land for feed crops.

●??????Additionally, the sunk cost of natural resources we bear on producing the food that goes to waste now finds a way back into the economy.

How it’s done

Traditionally, it was not uncommon for some farmers to make use of food waste to feed their livestock. But this practice is not scalable. Farmers need to consider what’s healthiest for their livestock. There is also the question of consistent availability, cost-efficiency and quality.

Fortunately, we now have the technology and infrastructure to formalise this practice. A new industry is taking shape that will standardise the waste to value process.

●??????Waste analytics software allows companies to manage their food waste across categories and locations.

●??????Reverse logistics ensure timely pickup of food surplus and rejects from food companies to feed manufacturers.

●??????Science-backed food processing and conversion methods allow for the production of high quality, nutritional animal feed at scale, making the process cost-effective and the product affordable.

It is crucial to understand that traditional food consumption is a linear process where there is little scope for recycling or upcycling waste or surplus produce. We are at a point in history where this process has become very taxing on the environment as well as our economy.

A circular food economy is what we need. In simple words, we need a food system that ensures our food never goes to waste but instead is reused, repurposed and recycled - ultimately helping to reduce the immense pressure on the world’s resources.

?

?

?

?