The latest in the growing number of efforts directed at reducing, repurposing and ultimately eliminating waste in all its forms.
Competitive school science fairs are a motif in the grade school education story. Often requiring a significant investment on the part of parents, the circumstances in which students must produce a contending project can create more stress than interest for the sciences and environmental studies.
The Closed Loop Foundation, in partnership with SC Johnson, today awarded two innovation grants to companies working to help solve film plastic packaging recycling:
The waste reduction experts at WRAP have brought together representatives from across the waste management sector to create an industry framework that could divert up to 11 million tonnes more recyclable material from disposal in England. Supported by the U.K.’s Department of Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) and DCLG, the ‘Framework for Greater Consistency in Household Recycling for England’ offers opportunities for businesses and local authorities to save money and avoid around 5 million tonnes of greenhouse gases.
A new short film featured by National Geographic highlights the plight of the Sargasso Sea – a diverse ecosystem of free-floating seaweed and unique wildlife – that is threatened by plastic waste. From microplastics to bioaccumulation, Care About the Ocean? Think Twice About Your Coffee Lid walks viewers through the dangers of plastic pollution in the Sargasso Sea (and other parts of the ocean) – and for human health.
Water is the primary ingredient in Coca-Cola’s and PepsiCo’s beverages, and both companies recognize that increasing stress on supply is a risk to their businesses. This week, both beverage giants announced progress updates for their global stewardship efforts.
In the ongoing fight against food waste, startups continue to innovate to offer solutions: Renewal Mill is turning waste such as olive pits and grape skin into new food products, and apps are springing up around the world to help restaurants, bakeries and more sell their leftover food at a discount. Meanwhile, Electrolux has launched a new global competition looking for innovative ideas to inspire home cooking.
One of the most significant challenges that manufacturers and major brands face today is maintaining high sustainability standards across their entire supply and production chain. It’s no new idea that consumer brands that have not embraced sustainability and CSR initiatives are at risk on many fronts, but integrating more environmentally sound and socially responsible processes requires sweeping infrastructure changes that many businesses may have difficulty implementing and sustaining.
In March, the governments of the East African Community, which includes Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi, proposed a ban on imports of secondhand clothes to their regional trade bloc. The ban would outlaw donations of clothing from wealthier countries by 2019.
In this week's roundup, UK-based organizations continue to lead the charge against food and beverage-related waste. First, grocery giant Asda has revealed the results of a customer-focused behavior change campaign; Frugalpac launched a new hot beverage cup that is made from recycled paper and can be recycled in any normal paper or cardboard facility; and egg processing plant Just Egg found a way to redirect its eggshell waste.
Cross-Posted from Supply Chain. In the south of Spain, unsustainable water use is threatening Doñana National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site and one of Europe’s most important wetlands. Located southwest of Seville, the Park supports millions of migratory birds and is a stronghold of the endangered Iberian lynx.
Found to be the worst-performing European country in terms of food waste in a 2015 study, the United Kingdom (UK) certainly seems to be setting a new course.
More than half of the United States isn’t recycling, and PepsiCo is setting out to help change that with a brand new ad. Designed to motivate people to recycle, the ad depicts a series of humorous examples of people doing activities halfway — like dog-grooming, running a race and mowing the lawn — as a way to remind them to take the extra step to recycle.
Food Cowboy, which uses mobile technology to help food companies route surplus and unsaleable inventory to charities and organic waste to composters, recently announced the launch of the No Waste Promise Alliance and the Food Waste Innovation Fund. Together, the Alliance and the Fund will invest up to $75 million a year in solutions that help eliminate food waste.
One of the biggest trends in business for years has been the paperless office. Many brands have taken the digital or paperless office to extremes; social media platform Buffer, for example, does not have a central office, relying on its employees to produce remotely. While this model is great for sustainability purposes, it isn’t ideal for larger organizations. However, that doesn’t mean that a brand the size of Amazon isn’t capable of going paperless. The conversion simply has to happen differently.
Confusion around food labels and expiry dates results in millions of tons of food waste each year, estimated to cost consumers $29 billion in the United States (US) and nearly £0.6 billion in the United Kingdom (UK). While many people throw away food because they perceive a safety risk, most date labels are not designed to indicate safety. Rather, “sell by” dates provide instructions for retail staff, “best before” refers to quality, and “use by” is related to safety.
Increasing prevention of food waste could save grocery retailers and food manufacturers in the United Kingdom £300 million a year, according to a recent analysis by the waste reduction experts at WRAP, but the task is easier said than done.
On the final afternoon of an action-packed week at SB'16 San Diego, this panel brought together stakeholders working to address different facets of the global water crisis, both locally in California, and internationally. The panel provided an opportunity for each to describe the work of their respective organisations and the challenges they see for sustainable water resource management.
“It didn’t make sense to me — to make a bunch of products that use a lot of materials, and then throw it away,” Scott Hamlin, co-founder at Looptworks, said during a Tuesday breakout session on partnerships in the circular economy at Sustainable Brands '16 San Diego. What Hamlin saw was a broken apparel industry, which focused on the traditional take-make-waste model. That’s why the social entrepreneur decided to found a company that doesn’t use virgin materials at all — and Looptworks was born. “We are called Looptworks because we are working toward a closed-loop system,” he said.
A partnership of leading international public and private organizations launched the Food Loss and Waste Accounting and Reporting Standard at the Global Green Growth Forum (3GF) 2016 Summit today in Copenhagen. The FLW Standard is the first-ever set of global definitions and reporting requirements for companies, countries and others to consistently and credibly measure, report on and manage food loss and waste. The standard comes as a growing number of governments, companies and other entities are making commitments to reduce food loss and waste.
Farmers in Uganda are bringing new meaning to the phrase ‘cut your losses.’ While European and North American countries are fighting food waste largely caused by excess, African countries face additional food loss and waste challenges due to lack of infrastructure, affordable transportation, and even harvesting techniques. Food that is grown cannot always reach the nations’ hungry, or the hungry simply cannot afford it.