Studies indicate that the ready meals and chilled products sector generates up to 12% of the total waste arising in the food and drink supply chain (including packaging).
The top causes of waste are:
Machinery performance problems – such as product blockages and mechanical mishandling; product damage is estimated to be between 2.5 and 9%;- Poor quality production – such as over/under baking and over/under weight; reject rates average 3.5%;
- Trimmings – such as un-reused pastry trim, bread crusts, tomato ends and vegetable peel;
- Packaging – such as raw material packaging and scrapped product packaging;
- Product disposals – such as products being past their sell-by or best-before dates; and
- Market ‘imposed’ – such as last-minute customer order cancellations, inaccurate demand forecasting and a sudden loss of orders due to a change in the weather.
How can produce waste be reduced?
Follow WRAP’s 5-5-5 approach to ensure you are taking the most effective steps to reducing waste and use the W.A.S.T.E. problem-solving tool to help you do this.
Examples of what manufacturers can do:
Technical improvements – walking the line can often identify problems between various parts of the process, for example are there any cases of machinery performance problems such as product jams and mechanical mis-handlings?- Increase rework where possible – if a waste can’t be prevented, can it be returned back to the process? Would better segregation stop it being contaminated so it could be reused?
- Could offcuts be used as an ingredient in another product in your range or could you sell them to another company?
- Ensure Standing Operating Procedures (SOPs) are appropriate – can customer or internal specifications be challenged to reduce waste but still meet necessary standards?
- Check if SOPs are being followed – are staff being over cautious in their quality checking and throwing out perfectly good product?
| Value chain analysis Greencore has worked in collaboration with Sainsbury’s and key suppliers to reduce food and packaging waste across the whole sandwich food supply chain. Using a Value Chain Analysis methodology, key process stages were mapped and improvement opportunities identified with the potential to save 1800 tonnes of waste by the end of 2015. |
Examples of what manufacturers and retailers could do collaboratively:
Improve supply chain communications
Work closely with suppliers and customers to minimise instances where ingredients and product are out of specification, close to sell-by date or returned.
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Timely orders |
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Faster and Fresher |
Work to optimise packaging:
- Look at reducing pack weight and using modified atmosphere packaging or improved seal integrity techniques to reduce the risk of food waste.
- Consider using returnable, re-usable transit packaging to reduce secondary packaging waste.
- Catering packs can also minimise packaging waste – but only if this is not going to create food waste due to product deterioration prior to use.
- Improved packaging design can also reduce the carbon impact of packaging.
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Re-using packaging to save money |
If it’s not possible to eliminate waste, manufacturers and retailers should:
Redistribute. Surplus food fit for human consumption can be redistributed to commercial organisations or charities such as Plan Zheroes, FareShare and Foodcycle. If not suitable for human consumption, investigate whether it can be sent for animal feed.- Recycle more. Where redistribution is not possible, consider composting food waste or sending it for anaerobic digestion instead of disposal to landfill.
There’s also a key part businesses can play in helping consumers reduce food waste and recycle more through:
- Improving packaging functionality, for example recloseable packs
- On pack guidance, for example recycling, date labelling and storage freezing and defrosting guidance
