Food Redistribution Research Articles

Preventing waste in food supply networks - a platform architecture for AI-driven forecasting based on heterogeneous big data

Waste is a major challenge in today´s food supply networks. It induces economic, ecologic, and social implications. Current advanced supply and demand planning frameworks consider waste as an expected lost value in a profit-seeking trade-off. Consequently, existing initiatives for food re-distribution tackle the problem at the end of the supply chain, i.e., at the retailer stage. Advanced forecasting is foreseen as a facilitator of planning towards food waste prevention. However, companies in food production and retail seldomly utilize advanced forecasting methods, i.e., artificial intelligence. Deterrents for inadaptability rank from the differentiation between the role of pure data driven reliance and the human factor. Furthermore, no remarkable endeavor has so far combined heterogeneous external data integration with advanced forecasting techniques for food waste reduction. This paper proposes an architecture for a collaborative digital demand and supply matching platform for perishable food supply chains. Focus lies in the integration of heterogeneous big data (i.e., mobile transaction data and weather data) with AI-based forecasting methods. Building on the Design Science Research methodology, problems and requirements from the perishable food industry form the base for the platform architecture as the core artifact. The validation of the proposed architecture is undertaken by a panel of selected business experts from food retail and wholesale. The designed platform architecture consists of the core modules “data layer”, “logic layer”, “interaction layer”, and “data visualization”, and includes governance rules for sensible knowledge protection and data security. The present work contributes to the research area of food waste prevention by combining collaborative supply chain management approaches with advanced data-driven technologies including artificial intelligence and heterogeneous big data integration. Further research will extend this study by a use-case implementation.

Effects of starvation on the fighting ability of invasive and autochthonous ants

Effects of starvation on the fighting ability of invasive and autochthonous ants

Increasing Surplus Food Redistribution to Improve Food Access Through a Partnership Between Public Health and a Technology-Based Company.

Redistributing surplus food that would otherwise be discarded represents a viable strategy both for increasing food access and for addressing climate change. This study describes a public-private partnership that scaled such an effort in Los Angeles County. Public health worked with a technology-based company to introduce a mobile app that connected various traditional (e.g., food pantries) and non-traditional (e.g., businesses with surplus food, food rescue organizations, community-based organizations that work in low-income communities) organizations with a countywide surplus food redistribution process. In 11 months, 50 food businesses participated, a total of 43,900 pounds of food were recovered, and surplus food was delivered to 34 community sites, serving 28,400 meals. Lessons from the experience suggest that mobile app use was a key component of the redistribution effort, and that diverting food waste while increasing food access, with a priority towards obtaining food of high nutritional value, was both feasible and practical. It has previously been shown that reducing food loss and waste by at least 50% in the food service sector could help reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.

Reducing food waste from social innovation perspective: a review of measures, research gaps and future directions

Food waste (FW) has been increasingly recognized as a severe environmental, social, and economic problem. Therefore, it should be tackled innovatively by analyzing and synthesizing existing solutions. This study aims to achieve a comprehensive understanding of different social innovation measures adopted for reducing FW using a systematic literature review. After locating, collecting, evaluating, and analyzing 50 publications from four databases, we conclude that social innovation activities such as digital food-sharing platforms, social supermarkets, solidarity stores, and food rescue hubs are widely deployed in different FW reduction processes. Based on the findings, we synthesized several research gaps and proposed corresponding future research directions related to research methodology, country, food redistribution, food rescue, food donation, and food sharing. These directions include conducting research to develop suitable key performance indicators to evaluate the performance of digital food-sharing platforms, linking with specific theory to conduct empirical research on partnership analysis regarding social supermarkets, and investigating the structure of multiplex relations among different participants in the food rescue activities using social network analysis. We suggest that more keywords should be scrutinized and included when searching publications in future research as keyword selection is subjective.

WASTE FOOD MANAGEMENT AND DONATION APP

Wasting food is a common problem in our society. Food waste management is crucial since it can improve our environmental and economic sustainability. We have identified the use of mobile technology to reduce food waste management and built an android mobile application that allows individual user or restaurants to donate and share their foods and leftovers with people in need. In order to reduce that food wastage problem through android application we planned to do this project. In this project the guest can login & enter their Location, amount of food and type of food available. Then a simple notification is given to the agent. After seeing the notification the agent among that location can login & can gather the details of the donor. The donor can hold an account in this application & whenever there is food wastage he can login and enter the details of food and location. The agent can also hold an account and can retrieve the details. After retrieving the details the agent can collect food from the donor and can redistribute to the orphans or others. This project is food redistribution is an enormously successful social innovation that tackles food waste and food poverty. The user’s details are maintained confidential because it maintains a separate account for each user.

Bounce back of almost wasted food: Redistribution of fresh fruit and vegetables surpluses from Istanbul's supermarkets

In recent years, there has been growing international consensus to prioritize food waste prevention. Addressing the prevention interventions of food waste re-emphasizes the requirement of reducing and ‘rescuing’ food surplus which would otherwise be wasted. Redistribution of surplus food is one of the ways to prevent potential food waste in supermarkets. This research, handling fresh fruit and vegetables surplus, attempts to provide an assessment of the food waste prevention intervention in retail stores thanks to redistribution. Data on surplus food rescued is collected from 97 stores in Istanbul metropolitan city and prevented food waste represents the surplus food that is sent to landfills at other times. The results show that it is possible to prevent 60% of fresh fruit and vegetable waste via redistribution of surplus food. In this article, life cycle assessment was used to compare the environmental impacts of the baseline situation where surplus food is redistributed with those linked to waste treatment scenarios. Analyzing 528.8 tons of surplus fruit and vegetables generated in 97 stores over 18 months, the environmental impacts avoided by redistributing surplus food were found to be: 375.1*10³ CO2-eq, 209.5*10³ m3 water, 135.8*104 MJ. The avoided economic impact was at a minimum of 1.42 million Turkish Liras (worth US $186,817 in 2020). Assessing food waste prevention interventions based on life cycle thinking with data from real-life cases would encourage such initiatives by identified environmental and economic benefits. This study has revealed that the potential of surplus food in supermarkets has not yet been noticed in countries which have no special legislation as Turkey. The results obtained by the research could be used by and help policymakers and the private sector to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals concerning food loss and waste reduction targets at the retail level.

Bulk and amino acid isotope analyses of hair detail adult diets and infant feeding practices among pre- and post-maize populations of the northern Chilean coast of the Atacama Desert

This study investigates diet heterogeneity among Chinchorro and Inca adults and subadults living on the northern Chilean coast of the Atacama Desert before and after the introduction of maize cultivation. This is achieved by amino acid carbon isotope analysis and bulk carbon, nitrogen, and sulphur isotope analysis of 1-cm sequential segments of scalp hair from human remains deposited at the funerary sites of Morro 1 and 1–6 (Archaic Period) and Camarones 9 (Late Period).Results show that Chinchorro adults relied predominantly on marine resources and partially on wild plants. Inter-individual variability in diet was limited, indicating food redistribution between sexes. Childhood and adolescent diets were comparable to those of the adults. Partial breastfeeding was continued up to the age of 2–3 yrs. Subsequently, Inca adults relied on a combination of marine resources and maize. Intra- and inter-individual variability in diet was limited suggesting existence of a centralised system of food procurement and redistribution. Childhood and juvenile diets were comparable to those of the adults, except for two malnourished children being raised on maize.Amino acid δ13C analysis of hair keratin is proposed as a potential tool for reconstructing the nutritional status of an infant without population-specific maternal isotope baseline.

Breadlines, victory gardens, or human rights?: Examining food insecurity discourses in Canada

Long before the exacerbating effects of COVID-19, household food insecurity (HFI) has been a persistent yet hidden problem in wealthy nations such as Canada, where it has been perpetuated in part through dominant discourses and practices. In this critique of HFI-related frameworks, we suggest that discourses organized around the production and (re)distribution of food, rather than income inequality, have misdirected household food insecurity reduction activities away from the central issue of poverty, even inadvertently enabling the ongoing neoliberal “rollback” of safety net functions. Unlike most scholarship that focuses on the politics of food systems, or health research that insufficiently politicizes poverty, this analysis emphasizes the role of politics in income discourses. In spite of their contradictions, food-provisioning- and income-based discourses are potentially complementary in their shared recognition of the right to food. Operating from the perspective of political economic theory, we conceive of the right to food as a claim not only to a resource but also to membership within political communities that envision alternatives to neoliberalism as manifested in our labour, welfare, and food systems. In this sense, the right to food offers a unifying framework that links civil society with senior governments, collective action with legal instruments, and food and income concerns. HFI reduction activities organized around the right to food may thus aim to rectify cross-cutting imbalances in political and economic power.

Government Policy and Practices to Support Malaysian Food Donors in Redistribution of Surplus Food. Are there sufficient?

Food waste has been described as a global problem with numerous root causes (Minor et al., 2019; Narvanen et al., 2020; Niina et al., 2022; Weber and Khademian, 2008). Food waste has reached alarming proportions, with approximately one-third of all food produced going to waste (FAO, 2014; Gustavsson et al., 2011). Food waste accounts for 20% of all food produced in the European Union(EU), costing 143 billion EUR annum (Stenmarck et al., 2016). A study was done by Future Directions International (FDI) in 2016 found that 25% of the globe's food waste happens in South and Southeast Asia. Food waste prevention at the source must be the main priority. Still, the EU's food waste hierarchy puts redistribution of surplus food for human consumption as the second-best option when food waste cannot be avoided (European Commission, 2020). Some Southeast Asia countries managed 64% of avoidable food waste by redistributing it to those in need (Tech Collective, 2019). Most food waste is managed via lower-priority methods, including composting, incineration, or landfill (European Comission, 2020; Eurostat, 2020; Obersteiner et al., 2021). Redistribution of surplus food or food donation to a marginalised community can be advantageous. Aside from the environmental, economic and social benefits, using the food for its intended purpose preserves its energy and nutrient content. Furthermore, surplus food redistribution is increasingly recognised to address food insecurity and food waste (Schneider, 2013). In Malaysia, the government is concerned with redistributing surplus food operated by a food bank or charity organisation via donations from the food retail industry (Hamik et al., 2021). Keywords: Redistribution, Surplus Food, Food Donor, Government Policy and Practices

GMM clustering for in-depth food accessibility pattern exploration and prediction model of food demand behavior

Understanding the dynamics of food banks' demand from food insecurity is essential in optimizing operational costs and equitable distribution of food, especially when demand is uncertain. Hence, Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) clustering is selected to extract patterns. The novelty is that GMM clustering is applied to identify the possible causes of food insecurity in a given region, understanding the characteristics and structure of the food assistance network in a particular region, and the clustering result is further utilized to explore the patterns of uncertain food demand behavior and its significant importance in inventory management and redistribution of surplus food thereby developing a two-stage hybrid food demand estimation model. Data obtained from a food bank network in Cleveland, Ohio, is used, and the clusters developed are studied and visualized. The results reveal that this proposed framework can make an in-depth identification of food accessibility and assistance patterns and provides better prediction accuracies of the leveraged statistical and machine learning algorithms by utilizing the GMM clustering results. Also, implementing the proposed framework for case studies based on different levels of planning led to practical results with remarkable ease and comfort intended for the respective planning team.

Food Insecurity, Food Waste, and Food Redistribution among Arabic-Speaking Countries: A Systematic Review

Over 20% of Arabs are food insecure; almost double the global figure (10.9%). Malnutrition also is the greatest challenge that nations with conflict are facing, despite the presence of several agencies that redistribute surplus food to the impoverished. Yet, this society wastes 34% of its food. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to discuss food insecurity, food waste, and redistribution in 22 Arabic-speaking countries. War, poverty, harsh climate conditions, limited agricultural resources, and food disposal are other risk factors for food insecurity. However, food redistribution would help in diminishing the gap between food waste and insecurity, which deserves further investigation. Other solutions include the development of agricultural projects; desalination of seawater and/or building dams, use of biotechnology to boost crop productivity and its nutrition quality, and resistance to drought and pests, adoption of food-waste reduction technologies; and development of new regulations/laws via tax reduction for donors and displaying fines for wasting food. Finally, the present review differs from other published manuscripts in that it establishes a database for researchers regarding not only food waste, but also describes reasons and suggested solutions to reduce hunger and food insecurity in the Arab world.

Meal Donation Application Using Flutter Technology

Abstract: This mission is used to control the wastage of food in a purposeful way. people are throwing away lots of meals each day. So, we have to reduce that food wastage problem through online application. This app is basically a Food Donation App that includes Food Providers (Providers, Individuals and Restaurants etc.) and Recipients (NGOs, Individuals etc.). This app sets out the details of leftover food and pick up address and other relevant information that can be viewed by Recipients. Recipients with their consent can access the specified location to download the food package. Effective management and security of data is maintained while developing our product. User information is kept private because it maintains a separate account for each user. The potential for food redistribution for this project could be an effective social implementation initiative addressing food waste and food poverty. Keywords: Meal donation, Meal wastage, mobile application, flutter, firebase, mobile application

A simheuristic algorithm for the stochastic one-commodity pickup and delivery travelling salesman problem

ABSTRACT The one-commodity pickup and delivery traveling salesman problem (1-PDTSP) concerns the transportation of single-type goods that are picked up from supply locations to be delivered to the demand points while minimizing transportation costs. 1-PDTSP finds several applications in practice including the food redistribution operations, where excess edible foods from restaurants and food vendors are collected and delivered to food banks or meal centers, which are then made available to those in need. This paper addresses the realistic case where the pickup and delivery quantities are rarely known in advance and studies the 1-PDTSP with stochastic demand and supply values. We propose a novel simheuristic algorithm, which combines VND metaheuristic with Monte Carlo simulation (SimVND) to solve the stochastic 1-PDTSP. The resulting algorithm takes into account both the transportation cost and the penalty cost, which is incurred due to the inability to satisfy the entire demand. The experimental results indicate that the SimVND solution performs well on deterministic data sets when compared with the existing solutions in the literature. On the stochastic problems, this algorithm leads to a significant decrease in the penalty costs compared to those observed under deterministic solutions. When the penalty costs of not being able to meet demand are high, simheuristic techniques provide a more reliable solution than deterministic heuristic solutions or limited scenario-based solutions.

How COVID-19 impacted surplus food redistribution in the Netherlands: An explorative study

The COVID-19 pandemic has been detrimental to food security globally. The Netherlands, despite its advanced stage of development, saw a surge in food insecurity among its most vulnerable citizens. Dutch food aid is managed by private charities and social organisations that often aim to address the problems of food insecurity and food waste by redistributing surplus food that is safe to consume. This paper investigates how the pandemic impacted surplus food redistribution in the country by employing an Exploratory-Descriptive-Qualitative approach. This is done by analysing data from interviews with relevant stakeholders involved in redistributing surplus food in the Netherlands as well as media reports on the topic. Our findings indicate that the interviewed organisations experienced drastic fluctuations in supply and demand. To cope with these changes, rapid organisational and supply chain innovation was observed. Next to this, there seems to have been disproportionate negative impact on smaller charities in comparison to bigger, better established organisations. Based on our findings, we discuss what the future of surplus food distribution in the Netherlands might look like and why changes made during the pandemic must be well documented and carefully analysed.

Studies on the Reduction of Food Waste through Redistribution of Unused Excess Food (Redistribution of Unused Excess Food)

Studies on the Reduction of Food Waste through Redistribution of Unused Excess Food (Redistribution of Unused Excess Food)

Surplus food donation: Effectiveness, carbon footprint, and rebound effect

Surplus food redistribution can be a way to relieve co-existing food insecurity and food waste. The food waste hierarchy ranks surplus food donations for human consumption as the next best strategy, when food waste cannot be prevented. However, the effectiveness of food donation in terms of the amount consumed, or food donation as a food waste management measure have rarely been assessed. The few studies conducted to date report substantial environmental savings, but the results may be sensitive to assumptions regarding substituted food. Rebound effects are also not included, but are likely to offset environmental savings from food donation. Therefore, this study investigated the effectiveness, carbon footprint, and rebound effect of a food donation system run by a charity in Sweden, and compared the results with those of anaerobic digestion. Multiple analytical methods were used, including material flow analysis, life cycle assessment, questionnaire, and 24-hour dietary recall. In the life cycle assessment, carbon footprint of substituted products were credited to the overall results using a system expansion. In addition, direct and indirect rebound effects associated with re-spending of substitution-related monetary savings were included. The results revealed a complex but effective network aimed at salvaging as much of the redistributed food as possible, with 78% of redistributed food eaten, but there was also a substantial rebound effect, offsetting 51% of potential carbon emissions savings from food donation. Nonetheless, the net result of food donation was almost twice the climate benefit of anaerobic digestion (-0.40 vs. -0.22 kg CO2e/FU), supporting the food waste hierarchy.

Political Imaginations of Community Kitchens in Sweden

Whereas the sociology of food has drawn attention to differences between corporate and alternative foodways, the political imaginations underpinning the latter are often overlooked. This article distinguishes between different political imaginations of the community kitchen, a set of practices characterised by collective preparation and redistribution of food. The analysis builds on ethnographic and archive material in Sweden to outline how the folkkök (people’s kitchen) was once an institutional practice to address urban food insecurity, soon outsourced as altruistic soup kitchens, and then regenerated a century later by the anarchist movement. By distinguishing between altruistic and anarchistic imaginations in this analysis, the article adds another layer to the critical sociological study of alternative foodways.

Data-driven optimal dynamic pricing strategy for reducing perishable food waste at retailers

Approximately forty per cent of fresh products are wasted in low and middle-income countries before reaching consumers. Perishable foods have only a certain shelf-life and they need to be sold for consumption before a specific date. When a product is priced incorrectly, it is often disposed of directly or redistributed. Redistribution of surplus food also has an economic impact on food prices. Therefore, setting an optimal pricing strategy is crucial to reduce inventory and surplus food in an environment with volatile demands. In this context, big data analytics can help managers forecast customer behaviour and determine pricing strategies throughout the retail industry. This study focuses on food waste at the retailer stage of food supply chain (FSC). We present a dynamic pricing model that uses real-time Internet of Things (IoT) sensor data as a novel contribution to decide pricing at different stages of a sales season for retailers. The food waste problem at the retail stage of a FSC is investigated in a pilot project for bulk apple sales to address the research question. This study proposes a four-stage data-driven optimal dynamic pricing strategy for bulk produce to reduce food waste for retailers in low and middle-income countries. A multi-stage dynamic programming method is used to decide on a pricing strategy for bulk produce, with real-time IoT sensor data being retrieved to analyse and determine the length of freshness scores. The effect of the sale price, replenishment amount, discount rate, and freshness score on profit and food waste are evaluated. All these analyses assist managers in taking the best possible actions and remedies. Appropriate interventions boost sales, increase profits by reducing waste and determining competitive sales price, while improving customer loyalty and satisfaction by striking the right balance between food quality and price. Our results show the huge potential of using hyperspectral imaging sensors in the FSC of a retailer. The model is demonstrated empirically to test its practicability.

The future of surplus food redistribution in the UK: Reimagining a ‘win-win’ scenario

Surplus food redistribution (SFR)ishailedas a ‘win-win’ strategy to address both household food insecurity and foodwaste.However,SFR is condemned as being a ‘band-aid’ solution that addresses neither the fundamental socio-economic causes of poverty,nor thesystematic roots of food waste.This research aims to set an agenda for the future of SFR in the UK for the next five to 10 years, including policy interventionsrequired to achievethis future.To this end, itcriticallyexamines the motivations, challenges andperspectives onSFR in the UK, explores the ideal future scenario of SFR (by reimagining the‘win-win’scenario), and identifies intervention pathways leading to this future. It achieves this through aparticipatory, mixed methods research design of17interviews, explorative scenario building and normative back casting exercises with40relevant SFR stakeholders across the private, public and third sectors.It concludes that SFR paradoxically reinforces the same problems it attempts to solve.The future of SFR lies intruly sustainable food systemsthatmeet the needs of the peopleand deliver socio-economic benefits whilst respecting planetary boundaries. In this future, SFR is no longer required as a solution for food waste or household food insecurity. Finally, the studyidentifiesfive pathways leading to this future:i) rejectingthe SFR ‘win-win’ narrativeii) tacklingsystematic food overproduction iii) eradicatingpovertyiv) balancing uneven power distribution amongst food systems actors, andv) delivering food security within planetary boundaries.The proposed interventions are relevant to food and waste policies,and offer insightsto transition pathways for sustainable food and other socio-technical systems.

Circular supply chain relationships for food redistribution

The issue of food waste has received increased attention in recent years, from both researchers and practitioners, due to the unethical and negative environmental implications of wasting food. Recovering waste effectively depends on existing or emergent relationships between food waste generators and receivers that facilitate food redistribution. Although previous studies have identified the importance of the relational aspect for achieving circularity, the extant literature has not yet fully explored redistribution in practice. The present study fills this void by exploring the formation of relationships for food redistribution that enhance circularity at the end of the food supply chain through 18 interviews in the food donor–receiver dyad. The results of the study reveal four categories – (1) ongoing redistribution, (2) sporadic redistribution, (3) the establishment of new relationships, and (4) relationship imbalance – that highlight that redistribution is supply-driven and thereby depends on a highly responsive demand side. The results are synthesised into a framework that presents improvements in surplus food recovery.