What does the project aim to do?
Support countries in harnessing green and digital technologies to reduce food waste at consumer level; contribute to the attainment of the SDGs and climate goals; support countries in Building Back Better from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The project aims to contribute to the following SDGs: SDG target 12.3 (halving food waste), SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure), SDG 12 (Sustainable Consumption and Production), SDG 13 (Climate Action) and SDG 17 (Partnerships).
Why?
Food waste exacerbates our triple planetary crises of climate, nature and pollution. One-third of the food produced for human consumption gets lost or wasted, costing 2.6 trillion USD annually.
Green and digital technologies are increasingly being used to reduce food waste at consumer level, including in storage, packaging, pre-treatment, portion control, compost, traceability, and supply-demand matching. This offers huge business opportunities and could accelerate the transition towards an Inclusive Green Economy and Sustainable Consumption and Production, in the course of Building Back Better.
How:
This project brings together different knowledge groups of UNEP for an integrated approach cutting across Economic and Trade Policy, Food and Food Waste, Consumer Information, Sustainable Lifestyles, and the International Resource Panel (IRP). This is combined with case studies of 4 cities in 4 regions, including:
- Bangkok (Thailand).
- Kampala (Uganda).
- Belgrade (Serbia).
- Doha (Qatar).
- Bogota (Colombia)
- Diagnosing the food waste problem in five cities
Working with local authorities to develop urban food waste baselines, accompanied by a survey to understand the causes and drivers of household food waste, including COVID-specific impacts.
Supporting food waste measurement by applying and contributing to the UNEP-led “Food Waste Index”.
Undertaking local policy analysis and stakeholder mapping to understand existing policies, measures and practices that have been tested or implemented to address food waste, and the wider policy framework that affects food waste indirectly.
- Understanding different enablers
Based on the diagnosis, analyzing different enablers (technological options, economic incentives, behavioral interventions, informational tools, investment, etc.) and successful business models; proposing a tailored intervention package to address food waste issue at consumer level.
- Engaging with target groups for change in policy, practice and behavior
Devising strategies of engaging critical food behavior actors in each locality; translating related evidence into easily accessible communication materials in local languages; developing engagement and dissemination strategies and identify partnerships for scaling up impacts.
The project’s one-pager summary can be downloaded from here
Important Milestones
- A global webinar co-hosted by UNEP and the Thailand Environment Institute on Dec 9 2020: The webinar will discuss how green and digital technologies could help to reduce food waste at consumer level.
- Joint Workshop with GO4SDGs on Food Waste Management in Asia and the Pacific (July 2021)
- Summary of city case studies: Bangkok, Belgrade, Kampala, Doha,
- Sustainable lifestyle campaigns in 5 cities (Sep 2021-Dec 2021, #GreenTechCities). Follow then on Instagram, Linkedin.