Combating Consumer Food Waste – An Exploration of Information Communication Technology Approach
Main Article Content
Keywords
food waste, food production, Information technology, supply chain, smart systems
Abstract
Existing food production and consumption rate especially from consumer’s point of view cannot be measured as viable due to varieties of social economic factors involved in the food supply chain. Combating food waste contributes extensively to food security measures and easing conservational burden thus improving justifiable consumption of food. Food waste emanating from consumers especially individual households is huge. A systematic approach to mitigate this is to creatively enlighten consumers as alertness and campaigns. However, literature reveals that complimentary initiatives are required to confront the problem of consumer waste. Information technology is comparatively new approach to lead consumers carefully using technical platforms and solutions in the right direction towards reducing food waste. This study tackles this research gap by conducting comprehensive reviews of articles pointing to food wastage prevention, weaknesses and potential usage of ICT tools for positive impacts on consumers to reduce food wastages. The study focuses on the use of ICT tools and techniques as a means to reduce food wastage. The reviews covered existing food wastage saving measures and applications (e.g. smart kitchen appliances, smart packaging and mobile applications). It further proposed a broad ICT driven food wastage avoidance framework that deals with the problem holistically. The framework shows how various levels of food supply chain can be integrated to tackle wastages from top to bottom in avoiding consumer wastage. However, future research is required to validate and build on this framework.
Article Metrics Graph
References
[2] H. Zhen et al., “Eco-compensation quantification of sustainable food waste management alternatives based on economic and environmental life cycle cost-benefit assessment,” J. Clean. Prod., vol. 382, p. 135289, 2023.
[3] G. FAO and others, “Global food losses and food waste--Extent, causes and prevention,” SAVE FOOD An Initiat. food loss waste Reduct., vol. 9, p. 2011, 2011.
[4] H. Ritchie, “Food Waste is Responsible for 6% of Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions. 2020,” 2020.
[5] World Health Organization(WHO), “UN Report: Global hunger numbers rose to as many as 828 million in 2021,” 2022.
[6] United States Environmental Protection Agency, “International Efforts on Wasted Food Recovery,” 2022.
[7] K. Obaideen, N. Shehata, E. T. Sayed, M. A. Abdelkareem, M. S. Mahmoud, and A. G. Olabi, “The role of wastewater treatment in achieving sustainable development goals (SDGs) and sustainability guideline,” Energy Nexus, vol. 7, p. 100112, 2022.
[8] I. Vazquez-Rowe, K. Ziegler-Rodriguez, M. Margallo, R. Kahhat, and R. Aldaco, “Climate action and food security: Strategies to reduce GHG emissions from food loss and waste in emerging economies,” Resour. Conserv. Recycl., vol. 170, p. 105562, 2021.
[9] A. Ciaghi and A. Villafiorita, “Beyond food sharing: Supporting food waste reduction with ICTs,” in 2016 IEEE International Smart Cities Conference (ISC2), 2016, pp. 1–6.
[10] Adebisi J.A, B. O. Moses, and others, “The Role of Network Technologies in the Enhancement of the Health, Education, and Energy Sectors,” Netw. Commun. Technol., vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 1–39, 2022.
[11] J. Adebisi and O. Babatunde, “Selection of Wireless Communication Technologies for Embedded Devices Using Multi-Critera Approach and Expert Opinon,” Niger. J. Technol. Dev., vol. inpress, 2022.
[12] V. Hanson and L. Ahmadi, “Mobile applications to reduce food waste within Canada: A review,” Can. Geogr. Géographe Can., vol. 66, no. 2, pp. 402–411, 2022.
[13] G. Funchal, V. Melo, and P. Leitão, “Cloud-enabled Integration of IoT Applications within the Farm to Fork to Reduce the Food Waste,” in 2022 IEEE 31st International Symposium on Industrial Electronics (ISIE), 2022, pp. 824–829.
[14] S. Ahmadzadeh, T. Ajmal, R. Ramanathan, and Y. Duan, “A Comprehensive Review on Food Waste Reduction Based on IoT and Big Data Technologies,” Sustainability, vol. 15, no. 4, p. 3482, 2023.
[15] X. Yang, “The Role of Too Good To Go in Addressing Food Waste in Sweden,” 2021.
[16] F. de Almeida Oroski, “Exploring food waste reducing apps—a business model lens,” Food Waste Manag. Solving Wicked Probl., pp. 367–387, 2020.
[17] E. Caffrey et al., “FoodCloud: Stimulating Kindness Towards Making the World a Fairer Place-One Step at a Time.,” Int. Rev. Entrep., vol. 18, no. 2, 2020.
[18] C. Martin-Rios, A. Hofmann, and N. Mackenzie, “Sustainability-oriented innovations in food waste management technology,” Sustainability, vol. 13, no. 1, p. 210, 2020.
[19] K. Parizeau, M. Von Massow, and R. Martin, “Household-level dynamics of food waste production and related beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours in Guelph, Ontario,” Waste Manag., vol. 35, pp. 207–217, 2015.
[20] J. C. Buzby and J. Hyman, “Total and per capita value of food loss in the United States,” Food Policy, vol. 37, no. 5, pp. 561–570, 2012.
[21] C. Reynolds et al., “Consumption-stage food waste reduction interventions--What works and how to design better interventions,” Food Policy, vol. 83, pp. 7–27, 2019.
[22] A. Halloran, J. Clement, N. Kornum, C. Bucatariu, and J. Magid, “Addressing food waste reduction in Denmark,” Food Policy, vol. 49, pp. 294–301, 2014.
[23] S. Fragapane and A. Mortara, “The Value of Networks Against Food Waste: The Case of ‘Too Good To Go,’” Ital. Sociol. Rev., vol. 12, no. 3, 2022.
[24] H. Yamakawa, I. Williams, P. Shaw, and K. Watanabe, “Food waste prevention: Lessons from the Love Food, Hate Waste campaign in the UK,” in Proceedings of the 16th International Waste Management and Landfill Symposium, S. Margherita di Pula, Sardinia, Italy, 2017, pp. 2–6.
[25] C. Council and S. Silpakar, “Food waste: Extent of the Issue and Current Interventions in ACT,” 2014.
[26] F. Girotto, L. Alibardi, and R. Cossu, “Food waste generation and industrial uses: A review,” Waste Manag., vol. 45, pp. 32–41, 2015.
[27] WRAP, “Food Waste Reduction Roadmap,” 2018.
[28] K. Verghese, H. Lewis, S. Lockrey, and H. Williams, “Packaging’s role in minimizing food loss and waste across the supply chain,” Packag. Technol. Sci., vol. 28, no. 7, pp. 603–620, 2015.
[29] T. E. Quested, E. Marsh, D. Stunell, and A. D. Parry, “Spaghetti soup: The complex world of food waste behaviours,” Resour. Conserv. Recycl., vol. 79, pp. 43–51, 2013.
[30] FUSIONS, “About FUSIONS,” 2016.
[31] FoodCloud, “How FoodCloud Retail works.”
[32] Too Good To Go, “Let’s fight food waste together,” 2022.
[33] V. B. Varela, “12 Apps Preventing Household Food Waste and Protecting the Planet,” 2021.
[34] V. Stancu, P. Haugaard, and L. Lähteenmäki, “Determinants of consumer food waste behaviour: Two routes to food waste,” Appetite, vol. 96, pp. 7–17, 2016.
[35] F. Lehn, Y. Goossens, and T. Schmidt, “Economic and environmental assessment of food waste reduction measures--Trialing a time-temperature indicator on salmon in HelloFresh meal boxes,” J. Clean. Prod., vol. 392, p. 136183, 2023.
Article Sidebar
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Licensing information
Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial License