Food waste can also be fought with apps. Some help to take advantage of end-of-day discounts on perishable foods. From bread to fruit to desserts, ready meals, and fresh pasta. Good and still fragrant food at super discounted prices. Others provide information on pantry and refrigerator management, with advice from qualified experts. We examined 5 of them.
Food waste, the subgoal SDG 12.3
Goal 12 of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development commits us all to ‘Ensure sustainable patterns of production and consumption.’ Point 3 specifically aims to cut by half the food waste that occurs along the path that food follows, from the field to the table.
Quantifying the squandering of resources that for more unfortunate populations is a rare commodity is difficult. In homes, however, it is easier to get an idea. The waste of food (and money) is in the stale bread, the wilted vegetables, the meal leftovers thrown into the bucket. In foods allowed to expire in overfilled refrigerators and pantries. (1) With a short-sighted, short-range view that does not imagine the fields and farms from which they come. Water, soil and the labor of the men employed to obtain them.
Apps against food waste
The downloadable anti-food waste apps on the smartphone that we reviewed are almost always a 4 times win solution. Useful to merchants, consumers, the environment, and the coffers of app companies, which make millions from virtuous business.
In a contemporary version of the procedure already adopted by some retailers to ‘dispose’ of unsold merchandise near closing time by offering steep discounts, the apps take advantage of geolocation. Downloaded for free to your smartphone, they allow you to locate all the stores and restaurants that prepare the boxes nearby.
Too Good To Go
In the genre, the best known app is
Too Good To Go
. Founded in Denmark in 2015 and landing in Italy in March 2019, on this a virtual platform shopkeepers and restaurateurs offer unsold food at about a third of the ordinary price. The unit of measurement is the Magic Box, a variable quantity of food sold at a fixed price (usually 3 to 5 euros).
The quantity and quality of food is at the discretion of the bidder. Consumers give feedback through a score (up to 5), which highlights 3 strengths (friendly staff, large quantity of food, value for money, etc.). You can indicate two preferences (vegetarian and vegan) but not food allergies.
Through the app you order and pay (by card or PayPal) for the Magic Box, score the merchant, and submit any complaints. On each sale, Too Good To Go retains 1.19 euros. That’s a hefty figure, considering that 4.6 million Magic Boxes were sold in Italy alone in two and a half years.
Phenix, the newest addition
Apparently similar to the Danish,
Phenix
is a French app created in 2014, active in 5 countries, with about 2.5 million users in Europe and just activated in Italy (for now only in Milan). In the beginning, the purpose was to direct expiring food from supermarkets and industry to charities.
Today, Phenix functions in much the same way as To Good To Go, while maintaining (free) collaboration with associations supporting vulnerable people and boasting the B-Corp and ESUS (Solidarity Company of Social Utility) certifications issued by the French government.
For consumers hunting for discounts, the app lists stores and restaurateurs with boxes of unsold food. Unlike the Danes, however, it retains the typical French consumer-friendly approach:
– allows filtering of food preferences including highlighting allergies (to gluten and lactose), adherence to a vegetarian, halal, organic, vegan, kosher diet, interested in locally produced and bulk products,
– offers active customer service 9-21,
– combines a loyalty program that allows you to accumulate points with each purchase, which can be turned into discounts,
– withholds from the sale of each box a commission of 1€ including vat per box sold at a price of 5€ or less or 20% including vat for higher amounts. With guaranteed transfer on the third day of each month.
LastMinuteSottoCasa, missing the sprint
The pattern is also the same for
LastMinuteSottoCasa
, a startup of the Polytechnic University of Turin. The app launched 5 years ago unfortunately remains geographically limited. The site also loses steam, lacking updates.
For the lucky residents of the served areas, the platform allows them to enjoy end-of-day discounts at area merchants. What fee is required from businesses? Nothing unless agreements are recontracted, explains the note posted by the website.
Myfoody, funds expired
Myfoody
on the other hand, is the result of an Italian enterprise and was created with the support of the Lombardy region and European funds. End-of-day discounts in this case come only from supermarkets.
The app reports on products discounted by up to 50 percent offered in supermarkets saved by the user in favorites. A blog provides some tips on the domestic use of food scraps. However, judging from the blog and the paucity of large-scale retail brands present (just 2 in Rome, Coop and Lidl), the initiative seems to have been stalled for a few years.
A Good Occasion, qualified advice
A Good Occasion
is finally the information app that helps to avoid wasting food. Again, the paucity of site updates indicate that the project is at a standstill. However, the published material deserves attention.
The app offers useful information for more than 500 foods. Among other things, guidance is offered by experts from the Piedmont, Aosta Valley and Liguria Experimental Zooprophylactic Institute on proper food storage and food safety. Always useful topics, especially when covered by experts in the field.
Notes
(1) On food waste related to the misunderstanding of food durability see previous articles:
- Dario Dongo. Expiration date and TMC, EFSA guidelines for reducing food waste. GIFT(Great Italian Food Trade), 12/20/20 https://www.greatitalianfoodtrade.it/etichette/data-di-scadenza-e-tmc-linee-guida-efsa-per-la-riduzione-degli-sprechi-alimentari
- Dario Dongo. Food waste, our battle on fresh milk. GIFT(Great Italian Food Trade), 7/24/19 https://www.greatitalianfoodtrade.it/consum-attori/sprechi-alimentari-la-nostra-battaglia-sul-latte-fresco
Professional journalist since January 1995, he has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and periodicals (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). She is the author of journalistic surveys on food, she has published the book "Reading labels to know what we eat".
