HomeWISE is the new research project — co-funded under the Horizon Europe programme — aimed at understanding consumer habits with regard to food waste and developing interventions for its reduction, with the aid of digital tools. The research consortium is coordinated by Exos AI Labs (Greece) and includes, among others, the University UTAD (Vila Real, Portugal) and our Wiise benefit, which respectively coordinated and played a central role in the previous Wasteless project, recently concluded.
The HomeWISE project
HomeWISE is a research project falling within the Horizon Europe programme, under the topic‘Research and innovation for food waste prevention and reduction at household level through measurement, monitoring and new technologies‘ (HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-FARM2FORK-04-two-stage) (CORDIS, 2025).
The proposals co-funded by the European Commission in this context must contribute to the following aspects:
- develop and validate new tools and methods and/or further test the existing methods (including those developed in previous EU-funded projects) to measure and estimate food waste at household level, including waste disposed of together with wastewater, with the further objective of distinguishing the avoidable (edible) fractions from the non-avoidable (non-edible) ones.
To this end, the potential of artificial intelligence and other technologies (including those currently available) must be considered, in order to simplify data collection and reporting (to be integrated into advanced monitoring solutions).
Projects must provide interoperable metadata standards for the indicators deriving from these new tools and methods. The metadata standards for edible and non-edible food waste indicators should enable, in particular, data integration through the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) infrastructure;
- these new tools and methods should be applied to a sufficiently large sample of foods and target groups (in terms of gender, age, socioeconomic status, ethnic and/or cultural backgrounds, etc.), to enable a precise assessment of the food waste fractions (edible and non-edible), over several years and in a significant number of Member States (as well as, where possible, in associated countries).
This work should generate a reliable measurement/estimate of household food waste for different target groups, at national level. The potential for wide adoption of the proposed solution should in turn be clearly highlighted;
- beyond measurement, it is necessary to investigate in depth the direct and indirect factors and the root causes of food waste at household level. Particular attention should be devoted to identifying consumer behaviours (patterns of food consumption and disposal) and other factors influencing food waste at household level, in order to assess the potential of a reduction strategy based on changing consumer behaviours.
Proposals could also explore environmentally friendly, low-impact and efficient technological solutions to prevent edible food from being discarded in households, for instance by preventing product spoilage.
HomeWISE – Innovative digital tools for consumers
The collection of data on food waste generated by consumers often includes approaches that are not particularly effective or are excessively burdensome from a practical standpoint, such as food diaries, questionnaires, surveys, and manual waste sorting with possible weighing. The level of citizen engagement therefore tends to be low, and the data consequently unreliable or insufficiently available, requiring integration with secondary data (e.g. statistical), which in turn tend to be imprecise.
The development of support tools is therefore essential to obtain accurate and reliable primary data, so as to support Member States in fulfilling their food waste reporting obligations. Such reports are indeed necessary to assess progress towards the targets set by SDG 12.3 (–50% of food waste by 2030, at distribution and consumption level) and to define the adoption of specific policies and strategies in individual territories, as well as to report the data to Eurostat.
The development of such tools is in turn highly complex, since it is necessary to:
- consider numerous parameters that must be measurable and actually measured on sufficiently large samples of foods and population groups;
- at the same time, facilitate their adoption by citizens, who should be encouraged to continue the data collection activity even after the conclusion of the project.
To achieve these objectives, HomeWISE will develop a comprehensive package of innovative, user-friendly AI-based tools.
Study of consumer habits
All the development and testing activities of the innovative digital tools will be preceded by a phase of study and review of consumer habits, as well as of the policies and regulations applied at EU and national level, to help mitigate the generation of food waste.
Direct citizen involvement will make it possible to define pilot groups for the testing activities of the innovative digital tools, launching various co-creation campaigns aimed at achieving more effective results, thanks also to the very participation of consumers in the project activities.
All the results achieved will be collected and translated into the measures needed to develop the innovative digital tools and to ensure their ease of use by households. As well as to generate accurate and reliable data for Member States’ reporting purposes and to enable households themselves to adopt new behaviours and habits to lower the levels of food waste possibly generated within their own homes.
HomeWISE pilot studies
The HomeWISE project will adopt a pilot programme involving at least 3,000 users across Europe over the four years of the project. Each pilot phase will take place in the last quarter of the project year, ensuring the continuity of longitudinal data collection and the opportunity to refine tools and framework between one pilot cycle and the next. This agile pilot structure fosters a seamless transition from the early stages of experimentation and learning to mature demonstration and systemic validation.
Each pilot will follow a multi-actor approach, involving households, retailers, municipalities, associations and schools. This will ensure the technical and social validation of the tools, strengthening their adoption across Europe. The engagement campaigns will take place in 8 European countries: Hungary, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Greece (selected to reflect the Northern, Southern, Western and Eastern EU contexts, the diverse cultural food practices and the varying levels of policy readiness) and will serve as the main reference countries for targeted recruitment and coordination.
The project results will build upon what has already been done in other projects, and may be used as a basis for drawing up new voluntary agreements by Member States and sector organisations.
WASTELESS and other Horizon projects
The HomeWISE project is the ‘spiritual’ heir of the WASTELESS project, in which WIISE participated by developing an electronic register based on a blockchain platform to facilitate the sharing of food waste data among food business operators at different stages of the supply chain, including primary production, processing and manufacturing, distribution and food services.
The recent conclusion of WASTELESS made it possible to identify numerous opportunities for the development and market placement of digital tools, so as to support supply chain operators and consumers in the fight against food waste. The recent amendment of the Waste Framework Directive introduced by Directive (EU) 2025/1892, indeed indicates the encouragement of innovation and the use of digital tools among the measures to be promoted by Member States.
The success of the project also stems from the contribution of other European research projects dedicated to the prevention and reduction of food waste, such as CHORIZO, REFRESH, SISTERS and EcoeFISHent. Integration into HomeWISE’s activities will ensure concrete and functional results, thanks also to the contribution provided by the outcomes of these projects.
Interim conclusions
HomeWISE is a project that aspires to introduce tools capable of stimulating an effective change in citizens’ habits within their own households, providing innovative digital tools able to simplify the measurement of food waste, while also delivering precise data on the categories and on the edible and non-edible fractions, as well as on the flows removed through drainage water (wastewater).
The active involvement of consumers will serve not only to study waste habits and drivers, but also to encourage a use tailored to the different categories of consumers, so as to keep the valorisation phase active over time, and not only during the project phase.
WIISE benefit will be responsible for ensuring compliance with the legal and ethical aspects of the project, which include conformity with privacy and AI-use requirements, as well as adherence to the regulatory framework on Member States’ reporting of the quantities of food waste produced by households, thereby concretely carrying forward the legacy left by WASTELESS.
Dario Dongo and Andrea Adelmo Della Penna
Credit cover Patricia Valério on Unsplash
References
CORDIS (2025, April 28). Research and innovation for food waste prevention and reduction at household level through measurement, monitoring and new technologies. https://cordis.europa.eu/programme/id/HORIZON_HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-FARM2FORK-04-two-stage
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
Graduated in Food Technologies and Biotechnologies, qualified food technologist, he follows the research and development area. With particular regard to European research projects (in Horizon 2020, PRIMA) where the FARE division of WIISE Srl, a benefit company, participates.
