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Reducing waste to feed the world
Infor ’ s Marcel Koks looks at what food manufacturers can do to help meet the challenge posed by a rapidly growing global population
The world population is forecast to grow to 9.3 billion by 2050 . According to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations , to support this , food production must increase by 60 percent . This is already a considerable challenge but when you factor in the ongoing impact of climate change on crops and supply , for example , 20 percent lower harvests of grains in Scandinavia because of the drought in May and June 2023 , El Nino impacting cacao and other crop harvests , and the olive harvest in Spain impacted by drought , it ’ s not hard to see why the global community is concerned .
At the same time , a third of our food is wasted globally and that amount only continues to grow . Calculations suggest that if we could reduce food waste and loss by 25 percent , we would have additional food for about 500 million people .
Vital waste reduction
In light of this , a rapidly growing number of food and beverage manufacturers are committed to the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN and try to reduce food waste , but much of it is lost to inefficiencies . For example , a farm may eliminate an oddly shaped fruit , spoilage may occur during overseas transportation due to a cooling malfunction , and
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