Biorefinery solutions for food processing wastes: A sustainable bioeconomic perspective

Abstract

Food waste is a significant emitter of greenhouse gases (mostly methane) that causes environmental devastation. Further, nearly onethird of produced food goes to wastage during the supply chain and harvesting process. These can contribute to a yearly loss of US$ 1 trillion. Considering these, there is a great concern all over the world regarding sustainable solutions for food waste minimization. For instance, the beverage, dairy, fruit and vegetable, and cereal industries create 26%, 21%, 14.8%, and 12.8% of food wastes, respectively. Such food waste is rich in protein, fat, carbohydrates, and so on, providing the possibility of fermentative products. Also, these food wastes are very homogeneous, which means they have a great potential for usage as feedstock in biorefineries (BRs), thereby greatly reducing the massive environmental load and offering sustainable resources to produce value-added products/chemicals like β-carotene, polyhydroxyalkanoates, lycopene, eicosapentaenoic acid, triacylglycerol (precursor for biodiesel) and so on. Food waste BR is a state-of-the-art facility that processes various types of food waste into useful value-added products. Food production in the EU (European Union) produces nearly 30 million tonnes of inedible food wastes per year. This value is expected to rise as the food processing business grows at a 4.3% CAGR from 2019 to 2024, hitting $4.1 trillion. Collectively, food waste BRs have great potential to empower circular bioeconomy, support fabrication sustainability, and solve environmental challenges. This review provides a distinctive overview of the latest developments in cutting-edge technologies for the bioconversion of food waste, as well as an in-depth analysis of each process, and critical aspects on development of sustainable biorefinery solutions for food processing wastes along with circular bioeconomy.