With a tantalising variety of satay chicken, wok-fried mud crab plus chilled tiger prawns, the dinner buffet at Singapore’s Grand Hyatt hotel typically sets diners back again about S$70 (RM227). Those on a tighter budget and with an eye on sustainability can fill a container for a 10th of the price.
Across Asia, tech online companies are taking food or else destined for landfill and providing reduced meals through mobile phone apps.
About a third of food is lost or squandered every year globally, and the mountains of waste materials are estimated to cause 8-10% associated with greenhouse gas exhausts such as methane, the United Nations says. The Asia-Pacific region is among the worst in the world designed for food waste, information systems for more than half food squandered internationally.
FURTHERMORE READ: Food-share apps seeking to help atmosphere
“A common mantra which i have is that being sustainable should be achievable, ” said Preston Wong, chief executive officer and co-founder of treatsure, which collaborates with chains including the Hyatt, Accor Group as well as the Singapore Marriott Tang Plaza Hotel to allow app users to choose and collect the “buffet-in-a-box” of foods that would otherwise be thrown out. “I think technology can bridge that gap, ” he said.
With more than 30, 500 users, treatsure offers saved an estimated 30 metric tons of food from going to waste since it launched within 2017, with users typically having to wait until the end associated with service before they can collect their food, according to Wong. Still, that’s a considerably cry from the 817, 000 tons of meals waste in Singapore in 2021, a 23% increase from the year prior. Regulators say the city state’s only landfill, Semakau, is expected to meet up with Singapore’s solid waste materials disposal needs up to 2035 and beyond.
Hong Kong face similar problems. It has currently filled up 13 landfills, and about 3, three hundred tons of food waste materials per day were dumped in its remaining websites in 2020, based on Hong Kong’s Environment Protection Department.
“The space is extremely limited, ” mentioned Anne-Claire Béraud, Hk country manager associated with Phenix by OnTheList, an app released in the territory a year ago. “Everything is very dense so there is not a lot of space to treat all this waste. ”
The app allows users to pick up a “Mystery Basket” of food with stores including Pret A Manger and local cake shop The Cakery for a minimum 50% low cost.
So far it’s sold 25, 500 baskets, with each equating to about one kilogram associated with food saved from going to waste and 4. 5 kilograms of CO2 emissions avoided, the company says.
Phenix’s unique platform was launched in France in 2014 and expanded in order to four other Europe where it’s stored 150 million foods. It collaborated along with OnTheList, a flash-sale company, to bring the app to Asia.
The idea of food sustainability continues to be in its infancy within Asia, compared with United states and Europe where authorities are cracking down. France has already banned supermarkets through throwing away unsold meals, and Spain lately drafted legislation to tackle waste simply by fining companies. ALL OF US states including California and New Jersey have got laws to reduce the quantity of food going to landfills.
That’s boosted the popularity of apps like Too Good To Go, which was launched within Denmark in 2016 and now operates in 17 countries including the US, Canada and the UK. It has provided more than 152 mil meals through the so-called Magic Hand bags, which are sold at a discount by stores and restaurants all in all with items that would certainly otherwise have been dumped.
In an area as culturally varied as Asia, smaller local startups are becoming a foothold providing to their home market.
Companies “have to suit that region’s tradition and habits”, said Taichi Isaku, co-founder and chief item officer of CoCooking, which created the Tabete food-rescue app in Japan. “It’s an area that has to become nurtured in order to successfully introduce new systems. ”
Tabete, released in 2018 in Japan, is really a free app with a similar business model to Too Good To Go. They have rescued 384, 500 meals, accumulated 525, 000 users, plus partnered with 2, 140 shops.
Tess Kermode, director of international expansion at UK-based Olio, agrees that businesses need to “understand the culture and the individuals in a particular market”.
The company operates in sixty two countries including Indian, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Asia and the Philippines. The app is mostly neighborhood based with nearby neighbours posting free foods to be picked up off their homes. So-called Food Waste Heroes also collect surplus produce from businesses plus bring it home to list.
Olio says the application has helped conserve almost 58 million portions of foods worldwide. Its biggest international market will be Singapore, where it has over 125, 000 users and an official partnership with foodpanda’s online market. The firm has goals to expand but , like other apps, says a lack of awareness of food sustainability in Asia is currently the handbrake on growth.
FURTHERMORE READ: Tasty deals: Apps help find unsold food and decrease waste in Indonesia
“Consumer-facing technology such as programs on personal gadgets can be very useful, ” said Anthony Bennett, senior food systems officer for the UN Food and Agriculture Company in the Asia-Pacific. “However, this topic should be considered along with increasing the entire food literacy meant for consumers. ”
Some apps, including treatsure and Tabete, are taking such matters into their own fingers and trying to educate users with tips on reducing food waste and recipes on their social media pages.
“In North America and Europe, there’s already been some maturity in understanding such difficulties and tackling all of them, ” said treatsure’s Wong. “But within Asia, this story has just begun. ” – Bloomberg