Asset to Zero Waste: Innovation, Science and Technology for Circular Waste Bioeconomics

• In Event: Regeneration, Promises and Innovation in the Bioeconomy

Abstract

Food Waste promotes debate around ethics and equity, the environment and ecological impact, and the sheer financial cost associated with our current production and consumption patterns. The 2017 documentary ‘Wasted’ provides an insightful examination of this complex issue forcing the viewer to confront some stark realities. At the simplest level we understand that we actually don’t need to produce more to feed the world - what is needed is a fundamental shift in our collective behavior and a shift in infrastructural, institutional and investment processes to close the loop.

Tackling food waste requires holistic understanding of the food system within the value web in which food products originate as assets, accumulating value through transformations to final consumption in its original or modified form. Through these processes waste is typically stripped of value and externalised from the food system - elided from view along with associated ecological and economic costs. Adopting an encompassing perspective of the entire cycle of movements enables the development of new modes of food recovery, redistributive systems and alternative consumption patterns. Innovation throughout the value web is facilitated by a deep understanding of ecology, the sciences and technological advances.

We explore contexts from across the globe to find models of innovative practices, which are disrupting current food waste narratives to promote regenerative processes. They provide a perspective on contingent yet grounded circular bioeconomies, that reconfigure and offer a view of what it will take to embed equity, ethics and responsibility to the challenges and opportunities of food waste.

Authors

• Nitha Palakshappa, Massey University

• Sita Venkateswar, Massey University