Fighting food waste – Meet GTC participant “Too Good To Go”
We’re proud to announce that we have received over 70 applications for this year’s GTC. As you read this, we’re selecting the 20 participants for 2016. Some of the participants have already secured themselves a spot in the sprint, simply because their business concepts are brilliant and have the potential to grow and make an impact globally.
Example of a meal purchased via the Too Good To Go App. (C) Too Good To Go..
Meet “Too Good To Go”
One of these brilliant participants is Too Good To Go. There is a fair chance you already know them, since they have more than 600.000 registered users worldwide.
Too Good To Go reduces food waste by connecting a variety of food suppliers like restaurants and bakeries with customers who are willing to buy a meal for a reduced prize at the end of the business day. In this way leftovers from the buffets and bakeries will generate money for the owners and food is saved from the waste bin. A win-win situation.
Food waste – a global challenge
Food waste is a hot topic in environmental circles and for a good reason. Food production is responsible for between 17-32 % of the global greenhouse emissions. Food production is hence a major contributor to global warming. People have to eat, but the fact is that 1/3 of the produced food is wasted – a terrible waste of resources.
Additional to contributing to global warming, food production is connected to deforestation, peatlands being burned and water systems being affected by the fertilizers and pesticides that are used to produce the food. Fighting food waste is fighting for a greener world.
A Danish perspective
There has been a lot of focus on food waste and a string of initiatives has led to Denmark reducing the food waste with 25 %. That makes Denmark front runners in the global fight to reduce food waste.Too Good To Go targets the food waste from the retail industry. They are not alone in that mission. There is a string of other initiatives such as the app YourLocal, the Supermarket WeFood that sells surplus food, supermarkets removing volume discounts and instead give reduced prices on products approaching the expiry date. Reducing food waste is trendy in Denmark, and there is no sign of the Danish consumers losing interest for the subject any time soon. Quite on the contrary.
Need for more food suppliers
A consequence of the consumers’ openness towards reducing food waste is the ironic situation that, despite having almost a thousand food suppliers, Too Good To Go urgently needs more suppliers to sign up for the service.
“Our dilemma is that we have a huge demand. We almost don’t have enough supply. The shops sell out really fast. So there are many (customers) who can not buy in principle. ” Thomas Bjørn Momsen, COO, Too Good To Go
The demand is there. Now we just need more food suppliers to supply their soon to be wasted food. In Green Tech Challenge, we are very excited to see, how far Too Good To Go will go.We believe that they have the potential to make a great difference for a greener and brighter future.
Want to learn more about food waste? Read more here
Denmark Capitalizes on Culture to Stop Food Waste – National Geographic
Nationalt videnscenter om madspild
Will Denmark win the Global Race against food waste? – The Huffington post
