Are you throwing out spoiled food nearly every week? While food waste is common, you probably feel guilty about it. Those bananas and green peppers, way past their prime, could’ve been part of a nutritious meal. If only you didn’t overestimate the amount of produce you needed for the week.
Besides the guilt over wasted food, there’s also the question of where your money is going. You’ve likely heard the expression “throwing money down the drain.” While the expression has both figurative and literal meanings, it does raise a valid point. Throwing out spoiled food means the money you spent could’ve been saved or directed elsewhere.
Sustainable eating aims to address the issues associated with wasted food, including the inefficient use of resources. Smarter meal kits are part of the sustainable eating solution. Food waste can be reduced throughout the supply chain. Additionally, kit services are evolving to incorporate enhanced technology, further reducing waste. Let’s look at the future of sustainable eating through smarter meal kits.
Customized Delivery
Households throw out unused food for usually one of two reasons. It went bad before they could eat it, or they ended up not liking the taste. The deal on a bag of avocados was too good to pass up. Yet, if you didn’t find a way to use all seven because you normally only get to two, five went in the garbage. Suddenly, that deal doesn’t seem like much of one at all.
Smart technology combined with healthy meal kits ensures your preferences for certain foods, like avocados, are met responsibly. The tech gets to know what you like, what you don’t, and how much food you’ll need. You’ll get personalized recommendations, but you can edit them before you check out.
One of the advantages of meal kits is that you don’t get more than what you need. Each ingredient is proportioned according to what your recipes call for. This includes the fresh produce you’ll put in salads, dinners with grilled veggies, and pasta dishes. Smart tech’s recommendations also adjust to your behaviors as your eating patterns change due to age or increased activity.
Organic Ingredients
You’ll find that some meal kit services are completely devoted to sourcing organic ingredients. Others have a blend of organic and non-organic, sometimes letting you choose. But, overall, many services make a point to use as many organic and seasonal foods as possible.
Organic foods are produced using more sustainable growing and farming practices. These practices use less energy and emit fewer greenhouse gases. Organic soils, or those without synthetic fertilizers and chemicals, also store more carbon. When soils store more carbon, it helps combat climate change by keeping temps closer to normal averages.
Switching to meal kits that prioritize organic foods means you’re not just contributing to environmental sustainability. You’re also supporting farming practices that don’t mass or overproduce food. In this way, meal kit services encourage production at a level that doesn’t result in waste at the source.
More Accurate Demand Forecasts
Walk into most grocery stores, and you see fully stocked shelves. The produce section has plenty of onions, tomatoes, apples, and lettuce to choose from. Stores don’t want to give the impression that there’s not enough to go around. For grocers, out-of-stock items mean lost sales.
Unfortunately, this practice can lead to increased food waste at the end of the supply chain. When demand isn’t forecasted accurately or stores order more for a bit of a cushion, unsold food has to go somewhere. Some of the leftovers may go to local food banks, yet too much of it will end up in a landfill.
Nearly 52% of waste comes from the food industry, including grocery stores and restaurants. Meal kit services use more accurate forecasting based on what people order each week. Ingredients in kits are often interchangeable between recipes. You might get two red onions in your kit one week that you’ll use to prepare three different meals. Kit services tend not to overorder because there aren’t storefront displays to keep stocked.
Predictive AI is also starting to play a role in accurate demand forecasting for meal kits. Variables such as food trends, order histories, and weather shifts are fed into algorithms. Suppliers can cut back on production when needed, and ramp back up as real-time demand for various items changes.
Plant-Based Foods
Plant-based foods are typically more sustainable because they don’t produce the greenhouse gas emissions that raising livestock does. Feedlots require land to be designated for keeping and feeding animals. The animals can emit methane gas as part of the feeding and digestion process. It also takes additional land to produce the crops that are fed to cattle or chickens.
While there are ways to reduce methane emissions from livestock, growing plant-based foods doesn’t have nearly the same environmental impact. Meal kits don’t necessarily cut out all animal products, but some services do. These delivery services target those who follow a vegan diet. Furthermore, most services offer vegetarian meal plans, helping to reduce some of the environmental impact.
What nearly all meal kits do is let you choose some plant-based and vegetarian options. It’s easier to pencil in a few meatless dinners and lunches every week. The services’ platforms also automate recipes and recommendations so you can expand your exposure to plant-based meals.
Sustainable Eating via Smarter Meal Kits
If food waste is a concern in your household, it’s understandable how you would want to cut back on groceries. But predicting your eating habits can be challenging because it’s nearly impossible to be objective about your own behaviors. And unless you have a way to track and analyze everything, you’re likely to repeat the same actions.
Smarter meal kits help you change those buying patterns so you can reduce your potential food waste. Through customized recommendations, portioned ingredients, organic, and plant-based options, you’ll be closer to sustainable eating. As the technology behind meal delivery selection becomes more accurate, you may not have any waste at all.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed here by the authors are their own, not those of Impakter.com — In the Cover: A men at the maket looking to reducing Food Waste Photo: Cover Photo Credit: Stockcake.com
