With 35% of all food in the U.S. going unsold or uneaten – and most of that ending up as food waste, going straight to landfill, incineration, down the drain, or simply being left in the fields to rot – figuring out a way to reduce it can seem like a daunting task.
But many food waste reduction solutions already exist – and businesses and organizations are figuring out new ways to address the problem every day.
ReFED’s Insights Engine (opens in a new tab) offers an analysis of more than 40 solutions to reduce food waste across all seven key action areas in our Roadmap to 2030. Achieving 100% implementation of these solutions would allow the country to reach its national goal of reducing food waste by 50% by the year 2030.
But even a more modest implementation would have a marked effect on the amount of food going to waste each year – and positively impact a number of key metrics. The Insights Engine’s Solutions Database (opens in a new tab) ranks solutions based on their net financial benefit, tons of food waste diverted, metric tons of greenhouse gases reduced, water saved, meals saved, and jobs created.
Additionally, different solutions will rank more highly for different stakeholder types – for example, manufacturers or grocery retailers. Based on the net financial benefit, here are the top three solutions for food business stakeholders:
Producers
- Imperfect & Surplus Produce Channels (opens in a new tab)
- Buyer Specification Expansion (opens in a new tab)
- Decreased Transit Time (opens in a new tab)
Manufacturers
- Manufacturing Byproduct Utilization (Upcycling) (opens in a new tab)
- Assisted Distressed Sales (opens in a new tab)
- Manufacturing Line Optimization (opens in a new tab)
Retailers
- Enhanced Demand Planning (opens in a new tab)
- Decreased Transit Time (opens in a new tab)
- Intelligent Routing (opens in a new tab)
Foodservice
- Waste Tracking (opens in a new tab)
- Markdown Alert Applications (opens in a new tab)
- Imperfect & Surplus Produce Channels (opens in a new tab)
Explore these solutions and more in the Insights Engine (opens in a new tab).
Access the Roadmap to 2030 At-A-Glance PDF (opens in a new tab).
ReFED is a U.S.-based nonprofit that partners with food businesses, funders, solution providers, policymakers, and more to solve food waste. Its vision is a sustainable, resilient, and inclusive food system that makes the best use of the food we grow. The organization serves as the definitive source for food waste data, providing the most comprehensive analysis of the food waste problem and solutions to address it. Through its tools and resources, in-person and virtual convenings, and services tailored to help businesses, funders, and solution providers scale their impact, ReFED works to increase adoption of food waste solutions across the supply chain.
Find more news and updates from the ReFED blog.