Food Waste Prevention

Abstract

Globally one-third of all food that is producedfor human consumption is wasted (FAO, 2013). Although it happens across theentire Food Supply Chain, 53% of all food waste in Europe takes place withinconsumers’ households (Stenmarck et al., 2016). All this waste has seriousconsequences for the environment and if we want to achieve our ‘food waste reductionof 30% by 2025 and 50% by 2030’ (UN, 2020) more needs to be done. An assignmentwas formulated together, with the Delft based organization I Change, to developa product/service that facilitates consumer food waste prevention by addressingthe household routines. By reviewing consumers’ existing household routines andthe motives of their food-wasting behavior, it has been discovered thatconflicting goals are the main reason consumers are wasting food. On the onehand consumers are willing to reduce their food waste because it is a purewaste of money, ethically wrong and because they feel ashamed or guilty whendoing it (van Dooren & Mensink, 2018). On the other hand, consumers wastefood because they strive for convenience, want to be good providers by makingsure there is enough to eat and want to be prepared for uncertainties (e.g.:working overtime, unexpected guests) (Graham-Rowe, Jessop & Sparks, 2014).  These food wasting motives have led to manyconsumers lacking the ‘good food habits’ needed to make both convenient andgood choices.  These good food habitsinclude making shopping lists, setting up meals plans and checking stock beforegoing shopping. According to Ooijendijk et al. (2019) having and sticking to theseroutines can prevent up to 50% of the total amount of food consumers waste.  Through an iterative design and test processEetkaartjes was developed. Essentially this product is a set of product categorylabels that consumers use in their fridge, freezer and/ or cupboards whichenables them to become better organized. Based on results from the testingphase it was concluded that through better organization, several of the previouslydiscussed lacking ‘good food habits’ improved. This ultimately resulted in lessfood being wasted.  I Change has beenprovided with several implementation options for the product. A productionproposal was made which enables them to continue with a detailed physical versionof the product. The affordable cost estimation and interest from theNetherlands Nutrition Centre, makes this an interesting direction to furtherlook into.  A second proposal was madefor a simplified flyer version of the product. This version is cheap to produceand easy to distribute but requires additional effort from the consumer toimplement it.  A third proposal was madein the direction of education. Samen Tegen Voedselverspilling expressedinterest into this direction and collaborative next steps are being discussed.  I Change is advised to continue theconversation with external parties and look into the different implementation possibilitiesof the product, conducting additional small scale tests to validate remaininguncertainties and determine which strategy has the most potential.