More than a third of the food produced ends up in the trash. Beverages and food, which are also responsible for 10% of greenhouse gases. These are estimates developed by Too Good to Go, a company that uses an app on mobile devices to try to mitigate this impact by negotiating with neighborhood stores, restaurant chains, hotels or supermarkets to make their food expire but, ideally, reach consumers.
“We continue to use China-sized territory to produce food that gets trash,” said Too Good to Go CEO Mete Like. “The problem of food waste has three perspectives. On the one hand, the environment. On the other hand, first of all, social. “This is a paradox, because we are talking about how to produce enough food for the whole planet, when in fact we are already doing it, and even so, 840 million people are sleeping hungry,” Mete Like told Spanish media. And Portuguese.
“The third aspect is economic. “The food waste is the equivalent of $ 1.2 trillion, which is the sum of the gross domestic product of Denmark, Sweden and Norway,” he said.
The company started in Spain four years ago. Since then, they have combined restaurants, shops, “hyper” and supermarkets. The latter is what allows the scale to jump. Today the app works in Spain with Carrefour and Alcampo who have the app for all of their establishments.
In addition, the project is being developed by two other groups of supermarkets with Iberian representation. On the one hand, Dia, which has an active application in Portugal, but, for the time being, not in Spain. On the other hand, the German group Lidl, which is in the development phase of a pilot project, has implemented an application in 74 facilities in Spain to gradually expand it to the entire chain, the spokesman said. It is very good to go to elDiario.es. Lidl currently has a chain of 630 stores in Spain.
At the regional level the app has facilities that are not implemented throughout the area. For example, Masymas supermarkets in Asturias and Levante, the Lupa chain of Cantabrian descent or the Catalan Condis and Ametller Origen.
As for how it works, how the app works, what consumers buy in food packages, at low prices, in the establishments where they request a purchase. Packages that are collected at times specified by stores or restaurants. In the case of “super”, but not in all buildings, these packages are divided into categories between greens, bread bakery or generic food.
In addition to retail distribution networks, the app also agreed to distribute food packages from hotel groups such as NH, Meliá or Barceló; Swedish group Ikea food products; Franchise brands such as Santagloria, Manolo Bakes, Domino’s Pizza or Bite the pasta; And from manufacturers such as Danone and Unilever.
It is very good that it started in 2016. It ensures that by 2021 it has managed to save 52.5 million food equivalents, compared to 28.6 million in 2020. It operates in the United States, Canada and much of the European Union, and in Spain it has more than 4.6 million users. The figure, which stood at 4 million at the beginning of 2022, is an increase that is unknown whether we can attribute the increase to inflation.
“We have not been able to determine whether this was caused by the price increase, but that may be one of the reasons,” said a company spokesman. The goal for the whole year is to reach 5 million customers in this market.
The food problem that gets in the trash covers all the links in the production and consumption chain. This was emphasized by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Luis Planas in an interview with elDiario.es. “Everything goes, because there are losses and waste in production, processing, distribution and consumption for the first time. “The most expensive food is the one that is wasted, because it is a product that has been wasted ecologically, economically and morally,” he said.
“This is an approximate figure, because we also need to improve the transparency and statistics we have; But there are studies by the FAO, the European Union and the Ministry, which name almost 30 kilograms or liters per capita and food loss and waste per year. The FAO says it is reducing food production by 20% to 30%. “This is an unbearable figure, because there are products that are in good condition,” Planas concluded.
Legislatively, the government approved a preliminary draft law on Food Loss and Waste Prevention in the first round last fall. The text stipulates that all agents in the chain must have a prevention plan to prevent waste. As well as a hierarchy of nutritional priorities. First, the use of human food, where donations to nonprofits or food banks are considered.
The draft also stipulates that food donated by manufacturers, distribution networks and restaurants must have a sufficient shelf life to enable its distribution and safe use by final recipients.
In addition, foods that are not for sale but are in optimal condition for consumption should be converted (such as juices or jams); And when they are not suitable for human consumption, they should be used as by-products for the production of animal feed or feed, for industry, for agricultural use, for the production of compost, or for the production of fuels such as biogas.
Source: El Diario
