The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations suggest that out of all food that is produced, 1/3 ends up as food waste. In high income countries, such as Sweden, the food waste mainly originates from the last stages of the food chain, e.g. at food stores and households. Sweden is a member of the EU as well as the United Nations, and follows the common legislation for waste in the EU and has adopted the Sustainable Development Goals from the United Nations. In the Sustainable Development Goal number 12, food waste in terms of reduction is addressed, although Sweden does not have a clear goal that addresses how to reduce food waste. Food banks have globally been a strategy to redistribute surplus food from the retail sector to people in need, something that has not been common in the Nordic region of Europe (including Sweden) until the 1980’s. However, in Sweden, food banks have not been used as a way to prevent food waste but as a way to help people in need, perhaps because there is a well-established well-fare system in the country. Recently, initiatives that redistribute surplus food from the retail sector have been developed - working towards different consumer groups and solutions. This study aimed to map out the different surplus food redistributing initiatives in Sweden, categorise them and analyse some of the initiatives that represented different solutions and consumer groups. The chosen initiatives were ReFood, City Mission Uppsala (Matkassen and Mikaelsgården), City Mission Stockholm (Matmissionen), Food2change, Foodloopz and Allwin. The methods used for analysing the chosen initiatives were Environmental Life Cycle Assessment, Social Life Cycle Assessment and Life Cycle Costing. To weigh the environmental-, social- and economic impacts against each other, a total sustainability ranking system was used to point out the most favourable option for a redistributing surplus food initiative, in terms of sustainability. The results showed that the environmental impacts (Green House Gases (kg CO2 equivalents/functional unit)) were the lowest for, in this order, ReFood, Mikaelsgården and Allwin, Foodloopz, Matmissionen and Matkassen, and Food2change. For the social impacts, the results showed that Allwin is the initiative that redistribute the largest amount of surplus food to the consumer group “exposed people”, followed by Matmissionen that redistribute the second largest amount of surplus food to “people with low income”. Allwin is also the initiative with the highest capacity and largest yearly environmental savings, as the company redistributes a much larger amount of food than the other initiatives. The results for the economic impacts showed that all but one initiative, Food2change, have monthly financial losses. The overall sustainability ranking showed that the initiative that is the most favourable is Matkassen followed by Matmissionen and Allwin, Food2change, Foodloopz, ReFood and Mikaelsgården.

Volatile fatty acids (VFAs) are important building blocks for the chemical industry. These acids can be produced through environmentally friendly processes from a variety of wastes, such as food waste, sludge and cow manure, through anaerobic digestion (AD). The main objective of this thesis was to investigate which operating parameters (e.g. pH, retention time, mix of substrate etc.) are optimal for producing VFAs as efficiently as possible, through AD batch processes. The highest VFA concentration was reached at pH 10 and at day 11 when food waste and sludge were used as substrate to a value of 15.4 g/L, corresponding to 0.77 g VFAs/ g of VSfed. Highest VFA concentration where cow manure was used as substrate was reached on day 10 and with a value of about 10 g/L corresponding to 0.51 g VFAs/ g VSfed. / Flyktiga fettsyror (VFAs) är en viktig byggsten inom den globala kemiindustrin. Dessa fettsyror kan produceras med hjälp av miljövänliga processer där en mängd olika sorters avfall, som t.ex. matavfall, avloppsslam och koavföring kan fungera som substrat, genom anaerobisk rötning. Det huvudsakliga målet med den här kandidatuppsatsen var att utreda vilka de optimala driftförhållanden var för särskilt utvalda driftparametrar (t.ex. pH, retentionstid, mix av substrat etc.) för att producera flyktiga fettsyror så effektivt som möjligt, genom anaerobisk rötning. Högst koncentration av VFAs nåddes vid pH 10 på dag 11 när matavfall och avloppsslam användes tillsammans som substrat till ett värde på 15 g/L, vilket motsvarar en avkastning på 0.77 g VFAs / g VSin. Högst VFAs-koncentration när koavföring användes som substrat nåddes på dag 10 med ett värde på 10 g/L, motsvarande en avkastning på 0.51 g VFA/ g VSin.

Background. The production of food requires great amounts of natural resources. Although, not all the food produced is consumed. Food waste is a global issue with the potential to create resource scarcity for future generations. Preventing food waste is an effective approach to avoid this outcome. Moreover, the prevention of food waste could decrease the environmental human print and balance the access to food around the world. In developed countries, the households contribute in a significant amount to the food waste problem.. It is mainly attributed to the behaviours that the consumers develop consciously and unconsciously. Therefore, it is significant to research further in the implications of awareness in the behaviours linked to food waste. Aspiration. The following research aims to find the effect of awareness in the consumer behaviours linked to food waste in the household through an experiment.    Method. A survey with 52 respondents was used to sample the participants of the experiment. From the respondents, 12 young adults aged between 18 to 29 years old, living by themselves in Visby, Sweden participated in the experimental study. The participants of the experiment were divided in two groups, the experimental and the control group. A treatment, consisting of an educational video regarding prevention of household food waste, was provided to the experimental group. The experiment measures how the participants were affected by the treatment.  Key findings. Regarding the awareness of household food waste, the experimental group had a significant improvement compared to the control group after the treatment. This proves that the consumers whose awareness of household food waste is increased present a higher potential to have their behaviours changed thus reducing household food waste. The hypothesis was proven, while the main finding indicates that as consumer advanced in the experiment the reported behaviours change considerably. While it was expected that the self-reporting of household food waste in the participants would be reduced, in fact, this incremented in some cases.

Background Worldwide, one-third of all produced food is going to waste, and the number is increasing every year which consequently calls for action. A substantial share of the food waste is the outcome of grocery stores throwing away suboptimal food which yet is eatable but due to the date labeling, damaged packaging or in terms of appearance standards cannot be sold. Throughout the last years, numerous unique businesses have been formed in Sweden to offer suboptimal food both online and in physical stores. Still, Swedish grocery stores stand for 30 000 tons of food being wasted which is directly linked to the still evident unwillingness to offer, purchase and consume suboptimal food. By no means, this is a significant problem and need to be changed in order to reach a more sustainable world. Till this day, qualitative research on the topic is scare. Purpose The purpose of this thesis is to understand which components that affected Swedish grocery shoppers’ attitudes and purchase intentions towards suboptimal food in-store. Method In order to fulfil the purpose of this study, a qualitative methodology has been utilized. The qualitative data has been collected through semi-structured interviews amongst Swedish grocery shoppers. To explore the attitudes and purchase intentions towards suboptimal food product, an abductive research approach was applied to strengthen previous research findings and attempt to discover possible new theory.  Conclusion The empirical findings revealed that Swedish grocery shoppers in this research study hold an overall positive attitude towards suboptimal food. The study further reports four prominent barriers towards Swedish grocery shoppers’ purchase intentions of suboptimal food. In result, even though an overall positive attitude presented, the intention to purchase suboptimal food could be severely weakened by substantial restrictions encountered in grocery stores.

The aim of this research is to develop the understanding of food waste behavior by analyzing student’s intention to reduce household food waste. The determinants Attitude, Subjective Norm and Perceived Behavioral Control (scope of Theory of Planned Behavior), as well as the Anticipated Emotions were therefore investigated. Data from a sample of 209 students at Uppsala University, Campus Gotland (Sweden) were collected with a web-based survey and used to identify the relevant factors. A multiple linear regression analysis showed that Attitude and Perceived Behavioral Control has a significant positive relation to the students’ Intention to reduce food waste. Subjective Norm and Anticipated Emotions did not reach statistical significance and could therefore not be used to draw conclusions. As a limitation, it must be considered that the focus is purely on the intention and the actual behavior was not part of the research. In addition, a missing universal definition of food waste leaves space for interpretation. What food (parts) is seen as edible depends on individual perception. People have different perceptions of what is edible. The findings of the research are helpful to recommend strategies on how to increase the intention to waste less food. Therefore it contributes to address the global issue of food waste. It outlines the factors that appear to drive the largest change in altering the intention to reduce food wastage.

Au cours des dernières années, l'impact environnemental de la consommation alimentaire des consommateurs est devenu un des principaux objectifs de l'attention publique et politique. Les déchets alimentaires constituent l'une des plus grandes fractions du total des déchets ménagers. La quantité de nourriture gaspillée dans l 'Union Européenne (EU - 27 pays) était estimée à environ 89 millions de tonnes par an, dont la plus forte proportion est produite par les ménages, qui produisent également la plus grande proportion de déchets évitables (BIO Intelligence Service, 2010).Il est surprenant que peu de recherches associent la consommation alimentaire à la recherche sur les déchets alimentaires. Notre intérêt pour les déchets alimentaires provient de deux sources. Tout d'abord, il est important du point de vue de la durabilité. Le gaspillage alimentaire est un problème de consommation avec des impacts négatifs sur les ressources naturelles. Deuxièmement, d'un point de vue académique, nous sommes intrigués par le peu d'intérêt des recherches menées par les consommateurs sur les comportements liés aux déchets et en particulier sur les déchets alimentaires. Les contributions susmentionnées introduisent le gaspillage alimentaire comme un sujet de recherche pour le comportement des consommateurs et évoquent les principales facettes du problème, identifient les principaux antécédents au gaspillage alimentaire et suggèrent des théories du comportement des consommateurs qui aident à mieux comprendre les questions pertinentes. En outre, deux mesures politiques possibles sont testées et d'autres recommandations sont données.Dans cette thèse, nous commençons par dessiner une image plus large du gaspillage alimentaire. Ce chapitre se concentre principalement sur les déchets alimentaires en identifiant les théories du comportement des consommateurs qui sous-tendent le comportement des consommateurs en matière de déchets et présente un ordre du jour détaillé pour les futures recherches et les répercussions sur les politiques publiques.À partir du premier chapitre, le chapitre deux explore une possible implication des théories comportementales dans la politique publique afin de prévenir les déchets alimentaires. À l'aide d'études expérimentales, ce document s'appuie sur la littérature des normes sociales et présente des preuves d'un processus qui explique les effets négatifs possibles des campagnes de sensibilisation qui utilisent des normes descriptives négatives. Lorsque les campagnes de sensibilisation utilisent ce type de normes, les consommateurs les perçoivent comme des messages de blâme et utilisent l'information comme une excuse pour se comporter pire que ce qu'ils auraient réellement en l'absence du message. Ce processus est expliqué par la perception de la difficulté de la tâche. Le chapitre présente également des solutions pour bloquer ces effets négatifs et aider à la prévention des déchets.La prochaine activité dans la lutte contre les déchets alimentaires est de réduire la quantité de déchets. Il existe différentes méthodes possibles pour résoudre ce problème: la bonne gestion des aliments au niveau de l'agriculture et du commerce de détail, le recyclage, l'utilisation de restes au niveau des consommateurs, etc. Le chapitre trois a porté sur les campagnes existantes visant à réduire les déchets alimentaires des agriculteurs, , Produits mal formés. En utilisant la conception expérimentale, ce chapitre explore les attitudes des consommateurs envers les produits mal conçus. L'objectif de ce chapitre est de présenter des preuves que les consommateurs ont des attitudes positives vis-à-vis des produits mal formés, que des campagnes de «production laide» peuvent être mises en œuvre avec succès sans nuire à l'image des détaillants et ainsi réduire les déchets alimentaires. / In recent years the environmental impact of personal food consumption has become a main focus of public and political attention. Food waste is one of the largest fractions of the total household waste. The quantity of food wasted in the European Union (EU - 27 countries) was estimated to be around 89 million tons annually, out of which the highest proportion is produced by households, who also produce the highest proportion of avoidable waste (BIO Intelligence Service, 2010).Surprisingly there is little research associating research on food consumption with research on food waste. Our interest in food waste stems from two sources. First it is important from a sustainability perspective. Food waste is a consumption problem with clearly negative impacts on natural resources. Second, from an academic perspective, we are intrigued by the little focus of consumer research on waste behaviors and particularly on food waste. The above contributions introduce food waste as a research topic for consumer research and elicit the main facets of the problem, identify the main antecedents of food waste, and suggest consumer behavior theories that help better understand the relevant issues. Furthermore, two possible policy measures are tested and further recommendations are given.In this thesis we start by drawing a larger image of food waste. This chapter focuses mostly on food waste by identifying consumer behavior theories that underlie consumers’ waste behavior and presents a detailed agenda for future research and for public policy implications.Drawing from the first chapter, Chapter Two explores one possible public policy implication of behavioral theories in order to prevent food waste. Using experimental studies, this paper builds on social norms literature and presents evidence for a process that explains the possible negative effects of awareness campaigns that use negative descriptive norms. When awareness campaigns use these types of norms, consumers perceive them as blaming messages and use the information as an excuse to behave worse than they actually would have in the absence of the message. This process is explained through perceptions of task difficulty. The chapter also presents solutions for blocking these negative effects and helping the prevention of waste.The next activity in the endeavor of fighting against food waste is reducing the amount of waste. There are different possible methods that can address this issue: proper food management at agricultural and retailing level, recycling, using leftovers at consumers’ level etc. Chapter Three focused on existing campaigns designed to reduce farmers’ food waste, by inciting consumers to purchase imperfect, misshaped produce. Using experimental design, this chapter is exploring the attitudes consumers have towards misshaped produce. The aim of this chapter is to present evidence that consumers have positive attitudes towards misshaped produce, that “ugly produce” campaigns can be implemented successfully without damaging retailers’ image and thus that food waste can be reduced.

Anaerobic digestion is a key energy and resource recovery technology. This work investigated potential organic waste resources to co-digest with household food waste (HFW) to stabilise the process and future-proof feedstock availability. This included novel feedstock macroalgae (seaweed) waste (SW). Hydrothermal (autoclave) pretreatment was also investigated to optimise energy recovery from HFW and SW. Preliminary experiments investigated the behaviour of HFW co-digested with either a green waste (GW) or paper waste (PW), using a batch-test laboratory scale and systematic approach with a revised waste mixture preparation method. Following preliminary trials, the co-digestion of HFW/SW was investigated using an air-dried SW mixture. Batch experiments to determine the biomethane potential (BMP) at different ratios of HFW to SW were set up. Co-digesting HFW and SW at ratio 90:10 (d.w.) achieved a BMP similar to HFW alone (252±13 and 251±1 cm3 g-1 VS, respectively), and a peak methane yield for HFW:SW (90:10) at day 12 of 69±3% compared to a peak methane yield for HFW at day 19 of 70±3%. Addition of SW optimised the C/N ratio, increased concentrations of essential micronutrients and produced an overall increase in reaction kinetics. Concentrations of SW ≥25%, associated with high sulphur levels, reduced final methane productivity. Analysis of the macroalgae strains L. digitata, U. lactuca and F. serratus from the SW mixture was carried out to compare mono-digestion and co-digestion with HFW at a 90:10 ratio and the effect of autoclave pretreatment at 136°C. Co-digestion had a positive impact on methane yields for U. lactuca and F. serratus, whilst autoclave pretreatment had no significant impact on the SW strains When results were modelled for a 320 m3 anaerobic digester treating 8m3 feed per day the theoretical energy balance showed that optimal energy production from pretreated HFW at 8.09 GJ/day respectively could be achieved. To verify the suitability of using macroalgae, known to readily uptake polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), toxicity tests were used to determine the impact of phenanthrene sorbed by U. lactuca on the AD process. Despite U. lactuca’s ability to biosorb phenanthrene in under 2 hours, no impact on the AD process was observed. Overall, results of this study demonstrated that co-digestion of HFW and SW, at batch laboratory scale, provide a viable and sustainable waste revalorisation solution. In addition, low temperature autoclave pretreatment increased methane production (p=0.002) from the AD of HFW.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-22T22:10:44Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 marcos bandeira.pdf: 1119544 bytes, checksum: a7cf163b06722e404fefa66895aa07b1 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-08-28 / This paper explores the application of the Production Engineering usual tools - Kaizen, Analysis and QC Story, Ishikawa, Pareto, five whys - against food waste in an industrial kitchen, with the objective of developing a protocol for implementing these tools and so contribute with suggestions to actions that could be adopted in the different existing kitchens. To this end, it was adopted the kind of research and Case Study, with an experimental approach, where the main scope is the production chain of meals in aprofessional kitchen, from the receiving points till the production process and the production delivery, limiting themselves to the environment and process of cooking. The conduct of the study was based on the Technical Regulation of Practices for Food Services of the National Health Surveillance Agency (ANVISA), since all internal actions must be conform to a Brazilian standard of food safety. The study environmentalist in a manufacturing company which supply collective meals and reach a volume with more than 4000 per day, and it is considered large and ideal for applying tools against waste scale. The research concluded that it is possible and advantageous to adopt Manufacturing Engineering Tools in the production process of industrial kitchens to reduce food waste. / Este trabalho explora o uso das ferramentas da Engenharia de Produção Kaizen, MASP, Ishikawa, Pareto, cinco porquês no combate aos desperdícios alimentares dentro de uma cozinha industrial, com o objetivo de elaborar um protocolo para aplicação destas ferramentas e assim contribuir com sugestão de ações que podem ser adotadas nas diferentes cozinhas existentes. Para tal, foi adotado o tipo de pesquisa Bibliográfica e Estudo de Caso, com uma abordagem quase-experimental, onde o escopo principal é a cadeia de produção de refeições em uma cozinha industrial, desde os pontos de recebimento do insumo para o processo produtivo à entrega do produto, limitando-se ao ambiente e processo da cozinha. A condução do trabalho foi baseada no Regulamento Técnico de Boas Práticas para Serviços de Alimentação da Agência Nacional de Vigilância Sanitária (ANVISA), visto que todas as ações internas precisam obedecer a um padrão de segurança alimentar. O estudo ambienta-se em uma empresa de manufatura onde o suprimento de refeições coletivas alcança um volume superior a 4.000 ao dia, sendo considerada de grande porte e ideal para aplicação de ferramentas contra o desperdício em escala. A pesquisa concluiu que é possível e vantajoso adotar as ferramentas da Engenharia de Produção no processo produtivo de cozinhas industriais para a redução de desperdícios de alimentos.

Approximately half of all wasted food is fruits and vegetables. One major cause of food waste is abnormal aesthetics; even if it is just as delicious as its normal counterpart. Food with a non-standard appearance (hereafter called ugly food) can be expelled by the markets. To reduce such waste, ugly food campaigns, which were developed in Europe and spread throughout the world, advocate for the consumption of ugly food. To study the problem of ugly food waste, this thesis examines ugly apples, since apples are the most common, representative, and readily accessible fruit. The objective of this thesis is to suggest marketing strategies and actions to facilitate the consumption and sales of ugly apples that can be expanded to other ugly fruits and vegetables. The data used for analysis are obtained from the Rural Development Administration in Korea. The findings of the thesis indicate that younger people and lower-income households are more likely to purchase ugly apples from online markets, non-stores such as food trucks and traditional markets compared with mega-scale discount stores. When advertising ugly apples, food quality should be emphasized rather than price.

Environmental problems such as pollution and overconsumption is something that is mentioned often in the news as this thesis is written. Food waste is a problem that causes valuable resources to be lost, as on average one third of all food globally is being wasted. The food chain is complicated, from the farm to the table, and innovations in all parts of the chain could help reduce the waste. We have aimed our scope to the end of the chain, when food is made at a restaurants to be served to customers. Figures say that about 23% of food in the restaurant business in Sweden is being wasted. To try to solve this problem, we have turned to service design and the methodologies presented there, to find a potential solution that could help reduce food waste. An extensive service design process was made with many interviews with restaurants to find where a solution could be made. The whole design process is presented in the report, and the final concept resolves around a sustainable lunch dish that can be made out of ingredients that would otherwise be thrown out. The dish would be sold at lunch restaurants for a reduced price since it is cheap to make, and would make more people act sustainable. A concept test was made to evaluate the the sustainable dish concept with the help from the public. The main question was: Is this concept something that could be adopted by people who buy lunch on a regular basis in Sweden? The concept test resulted in 165 respondents that were asked what they would choose to eat from a given menu. 32% chose the sustainable dish, and although biases were believed to have played a role in the decision, the concept was deemed successful. A website was then designed, aimed towards restaurants that wanted to adopt the concept and to get started in an easy way.