Dec 17 2019
Today, we are announcing a ground-breaking partnership to fight commercial food waste. A fight that cannot be fought alone.
SUEZ and Yume have formed a first of its kind collaboration to tackle the 4.1 million tonnes that goes to waste every year in Australia in the commercial sector, before it even reaches supermarkets, restaurants or homes.
War on Waste and Love Food Hate Waste movements shone a spotlight on food waste in the home and appealed to consumers to change habits at the end of the supply chain. However, if we take a trip upstream to where the food is grown and made there is a much bigger problem - some 55 per cent of all waste occurs in the commercial sector: primary production, manufacturing and wholesale. This is equivalent to 560 semi-trailer loads of edible food never reaching its destination, and instead going to waste, EVERY SINGLE DAY! This waste costs the economy $6 billion every year, on top of the substantial environmental and social impacts.
This is the uncomfortable truth of food waste, the one no one talks about and only few see. Yume and SUEZ have both seen it and have joined forces to tackle it. We are partnering to offer an integrated full service waste solution to makers and growers that honours the food waste hierarchy. Yume, an online marketplace for surplus food, will be the first interception point where product will be listed for sale to be rehomed and consumed as intended. SUEZ, a world leader in resource recovery and waste management will then focus on optimizing recycling, composting, and energy opportunities to extract the greatest value from precious food resources.
The partnership between Yume and SUEZ is founded on shared vision. We both have the environment at our core and believe a whole of industry and government approach is required to successfully transition our take-make-waste economy to a resource-recovery model. Yume, as a relatively young organisation, is benefiting from SUEZ’s deep specialist knowledge and industry connections. Meanwhile, SUEZ benefits from the ‘disruptor’ mindset that Yume brings as an innovative start-up. This unlikely collaboration creates a win-win-win outcome that will accelerate substantial improvements to the waste performance of the commercial food sector.
Katy Barfield founded Yume in 2014 with a bold vision of a world without waste. Australia has pledged along with 193 countries to adopt the UN Sustainable Development Goal to halve food waste by 2030. With only 10 years left on the clock, we need to unite and innovate. Yume is proud to have united with SUEZ to work together to provide an improved experience and service that directly and measurably diverts food from waste.
With 560 semi-trailer loads of food going to waste every day, it’s time to ask ourselves, what are we doing together to fight this issue?. The problem is huge, too big and confronting to be solved alone and the clock is ticking.
It is time to work together and stop food waste.