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Industry to tackle supply chain waste
Archived article dated Wednesday April 29th 2009
Environmental groups are to calculate the amount of fresh fruit and vegetables wasted in the UK retail supply chain, in a bid to find strategies to reduce the wastage.
New research led by the Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP) and Envirowise will calculate the total amount of fresh fruit and vegetable waste by product for the first time. A key outcome of the project will be the planned development of detailed 'resource maps', to identify the amounts of fresh produce and packaging waste generated for eleven products at key points in the supply chain, calculating the equivalent carbon and economic impacts.
“Understanding where and how much fresh produce food and packaging waste is generated at all points in the chain on a product-by-product basis will help to identify and develop the best solutions to reduce it. Implementing these solutions will enable considerable benefits to companies operating across the supply chain - economic and environmental - to be delivered and we would actively encourage companies to be part of this research,” says WRAP retail supply chain programme manager Charlotte Henderson.
Best practice guidance will be produced covering storage, handling and packaging, and reports will be made available for companies to benchmark themselves against the aggregated data. Opportunities for achieving environmental benefits and cost savings will also be identified.
WRAP and Envirowise are urging the retail sector to take part in the research to help give a detailed understanding of the waste produced across all components of the supply chain - from to back of store. Data collection will include company-specific waste prevention reviews carried out on-site.
The project is to be undertaken by research specialist Cranfield University, working with food and grocery supply chain expert IGD and the Fresh Produce Consortium (FPC), representing the fresh produce sector.
“This partnership brings together expertise and knowledge of the complexities in the retail and wholesale supply chain in the UK,” commented Dr Leon Terry of Cranfield University. “We are delighted to carry out this essential research.”
FPC chief executive Nigel Jenney says, “We are encouraging our members, including retailers, wholesalers and distributors to participate in the project, which will provide valuable information for the fresh produce sector on how to quantify and reduce both food and packaging waste.”
David Gordon, IGD director of Industry Development, says, “IGD is delighted to work with the FPC and Cranfield University on this timely project. It provides a real opportunity to build on previous work across fresh produce supply chains to address an issue of current significance to the industry.”
Interviews will be undertaken with participating companies from April onwards. Individual data sets will be kept confidential, and the findings are due to be published in the autumn.
Tagged as: Supply chain | wastage | WRAP | IGD | Cranfield University | FPC
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