Food loss and waste (FLW) is a more complex problem than it seems. A seminar on 7 February 2023, attended by a wide range of global experts as part of the Food and Nutrition Security Initiative (FaNSI), considered some novel aspects of FLW and reviewed research into tackling these issues.

View the webinar recording here

Following a fascinating but disturbing introduction on the interface of rodent pests and food, nutrition security and disease transmission, Rhodes Makundi, Professor of Ecology at Sokoine University of Agriculture shared decades of world leading research that shows the negative impacts of rodents, and how little we know about them. 

This was followed by nine ‘snapshots’ of cutting-edge research on different aspects of FLW.  Examples included:

• new work on food safety and quality management and its impact on society, by PhD student Shwe Phue San from Cambodia, referring to National food control systems and how they can embed consideration of waste
• the role chefs might take in their work and in changing consumer behaviour towards reducing FLW and its carbon impact, by PhD student Andrea Zick
• different food preservation innovations, including earlier detection of disease and using antifungals to reduce storage rot in apples, by Nigerian PhD student Asoo Dorcas Yaji.

Bringing the seminar together and focusing on innovation, Delia Grace, Professor of Food Safety Systems at NRI, led a star-studded global panel to discuss how we should prioritise our efforts to tackle FLW. 

Prof Dr. Barnabas Ikyo, Director of the Centre for Food Technology and Research (CEFTER), Benue State University Makurdi, Nigeria, showed how his group is embracing high technology, including irradiation, to help businesses reduce food spoilage. Dr Barbara Sturm, Scientific Director of the Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Engineering and Bioeconomy, Germany talked about interdisciplinary approaches dealing with human health, food losses and food safety and the appropriate technologies and methods involved.

Pawan Agarwal, Former CEO of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, currently CEO of Food Future Foundation, spoke of the challenges of scale in his country, the importance of the informal sector and the benefits of community coordination in relation to food safety. Dr Manoj Dora, Director of the Centre for Intelligent Supply Chains at the University of West Anglia, talked about the interface of technology and people and the use of better management methods and tools. Finally, Mr Jamie Crummie, co-founder and Director of ‘Too Good To Go’, a food app inspiring and empowering users to fight food waste, spoke of the power of low cost connectivity between businesses and individuals to improve the efficiency of food waste markets from experience in the UK.

NRI’s Dr Richard Colgan provided 5 take-home messages from the seminar to give us food for future discussion. These included

• Food loss and waste assessment requires long-term relationships with scientists on the ground. There are important links between Food Loss and Waste and Food Safety
• Greater granularity is required to improve the Food Loss and Waste data: seasonal factors and farmer support have impacts on data acquisition. Greater understanding is needed of the environmental impacts of FLW.
• Food Safety Risk Perception - greater knowledge on the risks associated with microbial, chemical contamination and nutritional loss of stored, processed, repurposed and prepared food products is needed.
• Improved policies, training, capacity building and new technologies are essential to help reduce FLW, taking into account the difficulty and expense of outreach to large numbers of smallholder farmers for technology intervention and adoption.
• Regulation, auditing, and certification systems can improve consumer confidence in food safety and reduce food wastage.

Keynote speaker profile

Professor Rhodes Makundi has had a long collaborative relationship with the Natural Resources Institute which began in the early 1980’s when he was working as an entomologist within the Ministry of Agriculture, Tanzania; a time when the larger grain borer - a beetle that causes significant damage to stored maize (corn) and cassava tubers - was accidentally introduced into sub-Saharan Africa causing massive post-harvest losses resulting in farmers protesting in many parts of the country to raise awareness about the new serious pest. During his time at the Ministry of Agriculture, Rhodes was awarded a two-year British Council Scholarship to study an MSc in Applied Entomology at the University of Newcastle. Afterwards Rhodes continued working with the Ministry of Agriculture as an entomologist until he joined Sokoine University of Agriculture in 1987 where he first started working on rodents as part of a Belgian government funded programme. He won a Commonwealth scholarship for PhD studies, returning to the University of Newcastle in 1992 and graduated in 1996. On his return to Tanzania, Rhodes’s research on rodents continued to expand. Connections to NRI started again in 2003 as part of a EC framework 5 project called RatZooMan, with continuing collaboration ever since on more than seven different research projects funded through the European Union, the African Union, the UK’s Department for International Development, The World Bank and currently the UKRI MRC. During much of this time Rhodes was the Director of the Pest Management Centre at Sokoine University, where the rodent research group has massively grown under his leadership and mentorship. In particular, funding from the World Bank’s African Centres of Excellence programme enabled this expansion and the establishment of a Centre for Excellence for Innovative Rodent Pest Management and Biosensor Technology Development at what is now called the Institute of Pest Management. Rhodes has authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers, book chapters, with many more in the popular press.

Panel member profiles

• Dr. Barnabas Ikyo: Director of the Centre for Food Technology and Research (CEFTER), Benue State University Makurdi, Nigeria.
• Dr. Barbara Sturm: Scientific Director of the Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Engineering and Bioeconomy (ATB).
• Pawan Agarwal (IAS):  Former CEO of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, currently CEO of Food Future Foundation (India).
• Dr. Manoj Dora: Director of the Centre for Intelligent Supply Chains, with core expertise in Operations and Supply Chain Management.
• Jamie Crummie: Co-founder and Director at Too Good To Go, which fights food waste primarily through an app that connects users with stores and restaurants with unused food.