Reducing Food Waste Through Technology Solutions

Food waste can contribute to the ongoing issue of malnutrition in many countries worldwide, as well as the squandering of valuable natural resources. Slashing food waste is a challenge many businesses are beginning to tackle and successfully doing so can bring significant benefits, both financial and environmental, to producers, retailers, and consumers alike. The Consumer Goods Forum has been providing a platform for shared resources under the auspices of their ‘Resolution on Food Waste’ since 2015.

As an international food retailer with a presence in 48 countries across four continents, SPAR retailers interact with over 14 million customers each day, leading to many opportunities to make a significant dent in the reduction of food waste. SPAR partners dedicated initiatives and projects target this issue at all levels – from production right through to consumption. A significant focus is placed on making investments and creating partnerships that reduce waste along the supply chain and tackle this issue instore. For example, we aim to further tackle food waste through scaling up its successful collaboration with digital platform Gander to a global scale.

The partnership will facilitate a wider roll-out across our markets, building on the successful launch in Northern Ireland, strengthening the collaborative, global approach we have towards food waste reduction. This partnership is another milestone in both parties’ strategy of using digital solutions to achieve a reduction in food waste within the food retail sector.

The increase of investment in real-time management systems combined with automated ordering systems has resulted in significant improvements being made in reducing food waste as ordering volumes are optimised.

Our partnership with Gander also follows our recent global collaboration with social impact company Too Good To Go. That joint initiative enables our customers to buy food – which could otherwise be wasted – at greatly reduced cost. Within the first four months of the partnership, over 1,200 SPAR stores in 12 countries offer groceries through Too Good To Go, with more joining every month, increasing the contribution of SPAR retailers to reducing food waste.

SPAR’s food waste reduction strategy leverages technology to achieve greater efficiency at each step, thereby leading to lower levels of food waste. These strategic partnerships with Gander and Too Good To Go reflect our commitment to reducing the impact of food waste on the environment and the execution of the brand’s tiered strategy targeting this issue at all levels. SPAR operators are using a variety of digital app solutions to alert consumers of solutions such as SPAR Norway’s automated replenishment system, NG-FLYT, which helps optimize stock ordering.

This blog was written and contributed by:

Tobias Wasmuht
Chief Executive Officer
SPAR International B.V.