Food waste: a technology worth serving up to investors

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Can you magic money out of nowhere? The kitchen bin is a good place to start. 

In the UK, an average family throws away at least £60 worth of food a month, estimates climate group WRAP. Globally, almost 30 per cent of agricultural land is used to produce food that is lost or wasted, says the United Nations.

The EU has proposed a 30 per cent per capita reduction in food wasted in homes and restaurants by the end of 2030. Such targets will help attract investor interest to the emerging food waste technology sector, although there will be limits to how much science can conquer human nature.

Consumers are the main culprits. Households accounted for 70kg of the 131kg of food wasted per inhabitant in the EU in 2021, according to lagging Eurostat data.

Food waste technologies cover a broad area. Investors have proved particularly willing to put sizeable bets on biogas, produced from food and agricultural waste. Shell this year completed a €1.9bn takeover of Danish biogas producer Nature Energy.

Other technologies can include edible fruit coatings to improve freshness.

However, funding for food waste solutions in the US fell 14 per cent to $1.7bn in 2022, according to non-profit ReFED. The sector was swept up in the wider tech funding downturn. 2021 was also a record. So far in 2023, the funding tally is shy of $1bn.

There are barriers. Not least, food waste specialists acknowledge consumer behaviour can be difficult to change. Some technologies can add to the price of food and are therefore vulnerable during downturns. That may cause investors to pause before gobbling up too many food waste tech start-ups.