Swedish Sustainability: Food Waste
23rd November 2020
Denis Buckley, Markets - Stockholm, Bord Bia - The Irish Food Board
Swedes have long been at the forefront of sustainability and they are continually searching for new ways to improve their environmental impact. By the end of 2018, the Swedish Government had already exceeded their 2020 recycling targets that 70% of glass and 65% of paper in the country would be recycled. In actuality, 93% of glass and 82% of paper was recycled (Sweden.se, 2020).
The Swedish National Food Agency, in collaboration with the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and the Swedish Board of Agriculture, has developed the action plan "More to do more" in order to reduce food waste throughout the whole food chain. The action plan extends over six years from 2020 to 2025. The Swedish Government outlined that changes in consumer behaviour were a prerequisite to bring about a reduction in food waste as Swedish consumers often express difficulty in understanding which foods are more sustainable than others (livsmedelsverket.se, 2020). Eight out of ten Swedes find it difficult to know which food is best for the environment and climate (FoodSupply, 2020).
Several new initiatives are at the forefront of tackling food waste in line with the Government’s Action plan for food loss and food waste reduction by 2030. Some influential food and drink companies are stepping up to the plate and taking personal responsibility by tackling food waste head on and through educating their customers about making more sustainable food choices:
Veat: are a Swedish start up plant-based foods vending machine Company. They are already tackling food waste by donating any unsold food to local Stockholm charities (The spoon, 2020).
Coop Sweden: have set a new food waste reduction target wherein they promise that their food waste will amount to less than 1% of their sales across all their operations by 2025 (IGD, 2020).
Hellman’s: have rolled out a restaurant ‘with no food’ in Sweden. The concept involves customers bringing whatever leftovers are in their fridge to the restaurant and chefs being tasked with producing a five star meal. Instead of receiving a bill, customers would receive a recipe of the meal that was just prepared for them.
Orkla (owners of Felix):have recently began placing a new climate label on their products with low carbon footprints. The aim is to make the consumer more climate smart and allow them to make more sustainably minded food purchases with ease. The below grid highlights the climate impact of products with the low climate label.
To further add to their sustainability efforts, Felix have also opened up the first store of its kind wherein goods are priced based on their carbon emissions. In the Climate Store, customers pay with carbon dioxide equivalents. Felix states that, in order to halve our climate impact, every customer must keep to a weekly budget of 18.9 kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalents. By using a climate-based currency, Felix highlights what the true cost of food really is, and that the change in our pocket is equal to the change needed for a sustainable world (Newfood, 2020).
Orkla have also began to use seaweed as an ingredient in several of the Group's product areas. Seaweed is seen as a sustainable source of food production as it only requires sunlight and seawater to grow, each of which can be obtained naturally for the environment. Marine vegetables are also naturally rich in beneficial nutrients and can make a significant contribution to increasing global food production for a growing world population (Foodvarefokus, 2020).
The Swedish Government’s food waste strategy for 2020 is to use 50% of food waste as natural fertilizer, with another 40% being used to generate energy. The increased threat of climate change has also led Sweden to use food waste to make climate-friendly biogas fuel (Sweden.se, 2020). According to Bord Bia’s consumer and lifestyle trends 2019, Responsible living has been identified and a sub trend of this is innovating against food waste. This something at which the Swedes do well by creating a circular economy.
References:
Behance (2020) – The Restaurant with no Food. Available at: https://www.behance.net/gallery/78880049/HELLMANNS-The-Restaurant-With-No-Food
BordBia (2019) – Consumer Lifestyle Trends. Available at: https://www.bordbiaconsumerlifestyletrends.ie/trends/
Felix (2020) - We make it easier to choose climate-smart! Available at: https://www.felix.se/hallbarhet/klimatavtryck/
Foodsupply (2020) - Felix starts with new climate labeling. Available at: https://www.food-supply.se/article/view/739746/felix_borjar_med_ny_klimatmarkning?utm_campaign=Nordic%20Agri%20Review&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=2&utm_content=2&utm_source=hs_email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9BBBG-QoKBdrQUMWa5kRMF93urXjYjbHVG5bb2FDo4jjWrJrGa70Eex8-1lNe18VKxaKSp
Foodvarefokus (2020) - Focuses on Seaweed as a Raw Material in a new Business area. Available at: https://www.fodevarefokus.dk/satser-paa-tang-som-raavare-i-nyt-forretningsomraade/?utm_campaign=Nordic%20Agri%20Review&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9BBBG-QoKBdrQUMWa5kRMF93urXjYjbHVG5bb2FDo4jjWrJrGa70Eex8-1lNe18VKxaKSp
IGD Retail Analysis (2020) - How three retailers are investing in their sustainability initiatives. Available at: https://retailanalysis.igd.com/markets/sweden/news/news-article/t/how-three-retailers-are-investing-in-their-sustainability-initiatives/i/26869
Livsmedelsverket.se (2020) - Action plan for food losses and waste reduction in Sweden. Available at: https://www.livsmedelsverket.se/en/production-control-and-trade/food-production/food-loss-and-food-waste-business/action-plan-for-food-loss-and-waste-reduction-in-sweden?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1#
Newfood (2020) - New store in Sweden prices goods based on carbon emissions. Available at: https://www.newfoodmagazine.com/news/121153/new-store-in-sweden-prices-goods-based-on-carbon-emissions/
Sweden.se (2020) – The Swedish Recycling Revolution. Available at: https://sweden.se/nature/the-swedish-recycling-revolution/#
The Spoon (2020) - VEAT Raises €0.5M Pre-Seed Round, Launches Vending Machine for Plant-Based Foods. Available at: https://thespoon.tech/veat-raises-e-50m-pre-seed-round-launches-vending-machine-for-plant-based-foods/