The food processing industry plays a significant role in the U.S. economy, producing more than $1.08 trillion in annual economic output.
And while food processing is absolutely essential, food waste in the food processing industry has become a huge issue, with overproduction, poor inventory management, and processing inefficiencies all being causes of food waste.
With about a pound of food wasted per person per day in the U.S., the processing industry must adopt innovative strategies—such as upcycling food waste, better quality control, and improved packaging—to reduce waste. This, in turn, helps businesses increase sustainability, cut costs, and ensure regulatory compliance, providing a huge incentive for better waste management.
Keep reading to learn about the types of food processing waste, key challenges of waste management, and the benefits of reducing food waste.
Key Takeaways
- Food processing waste consists of brewer’s grain and yeast, dairy, slaughterhouse waste, items removed from fruits and vegetables, liquid by-products, and more.
- To reduce waste, food waste technologies can be used to monitor the temperature and humidity levels of storage rooms, track food waste throughout the supply chain, improve demand forecasting, and transform organic waste into other resources.
- Implementing robust quality control measures not only enhances product quality but also minimizes waste, improves compliance with regulations, and builds consumer trust in your food products.
- Food processing companies can perform food waste audits to identify waste sources and quantities in order to create more effective waste management strategies. This can be done at the beginning of strategy planning but also performed regularly to track the progress of your program.
Understanding What is Waste in the Food Processing Industry
A 1995 study on industrial food processing waste showed that fresh and processed fruits and vegetables, fluid dairy products, and meat (including poultry and fish) made up almost 55 percent of the food loss, with the remaining 45 percent coming from grain products, caloric sweeteners, fats and oils, and a category of “other” foods.
But to better understand waste from the food processing industry, let’s explore its types and sources in greater detail.
Types of Waste in Food Processing
So, what are the types of food processing waste?
While there are many different types of waste, they can be broken down into two groups: solid waste and liquid waste.
Solid Waste
Solid waste consists of brewer’s grain and yeast, slaughterhouse waste like feathers, bones, and manure, and items removed from fruits and vegetables—such as leaves, peels, pomace, skins, rinds, cores, pits, pulp, stems, seeds, twigs, and spoiled fruits and vegetables.
Liquid Waste
Liquid waste, on the other hand, includes dairy, wastewater, blood from slaughterhouse waste, and liquid by-products. Wastewater is particularly concerning, as it’s produced in large quantities and requires proper liquid food waste management to mitigate its impact.
Sources of Waste in Food Processing
There are multiple sources of food processing waste, making it a complex issue that requires tailored waste management solutions. That said, here are some of the common sources of waste in this industry:
Solid Waste
Solid waste is often due to the cleaning, processing, cooking, and packaging of food. For instance, the peels, pulp, and seeds of an orange are discarded when oranges are processed to extract juice.
Liquid Waste
There are various sources of liquid waste, including wastewater from cleaning equipment and whey from cheese production. Another large contributor of liquid waste, however, is the wastewater generated during the preparation of raw ingredients, such as washing, cleaning, and boiling.
4 Key Challenges of Waste Management in Food Processing
To help your business navigate potential obstacles when implementing waste management in the food processing industry, let’s take a look at the common challenges companies face.
1. Environmental Challenges
Food waste affects the environment in multiple ways, including its role in pollution, resource depletion, loss of biodiversity, and methane emissions. So how does the food processing sector contribute to this?
To start, food waste in the processing industry is a large contributor to cross-contamination, leading to air, water, and soil pollution. Even more, when food is sent to the landfill, it contributes to a variety of environmental concerns. Of these, methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that’s produced when food decomposes in landfills, poses a huge threat to the environment.
In addition, when food is wasted, it also wastes all the resources required to produce it. For instance, let’s say apples are discarded due to strict grading and sorting processes. This means that the resources used to produce them, store them, and transport them to processing centers are all wasted as well.
There are various ways to address these inefficiencies. Building on the example above, the imperfect apples can be made into an apple jam or used in other recipes to avoid discarding them. This is just one example of how ingredients can be upcycled. That said, since there are various sources of waste in this industry, a comprehensive waste management strategy is required to reduce its environmental impact.
2. Regulatory and Compliance Issues
Food regulations are critical in protecting public health. These policies not only cover how food is stored, handled, and transported, but also how it’s disposed of.
And while these policies help the U.S. work towards its national goal of reducing food loss and waste in the U.S. by 50% by 2030, the inconsistencies in food waste laws in the United States contribute to the challenges businesses face in food waste processing. Why?
Because in addition to federal food waste laws in the United States, there are also state- and city-wide laws, meaning companies must stay up to date with the ever-changing regulatory landscape.
In other words, what may apply to one company may not apply to the other, depending on where they’re located. This process is especially difficult for companies that try to navigate these challenges alone, rather than working with a waste management company.
3. Inadequate Waste Management Processing
Waste management is complex, meaning there are a variety of obstacles that companies may face when implementing new processes. This includes a lack of adequate collection and disposal infrastructure, insufficient funding for waste management programs, and limited recycling programs available in your area.
Additionally, a general lack of awareness about waste management leaves many companies unsure how to effectively handle waste management in the food processing industry.
Since there are various challenges that businesses may face, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to waste management. That said, businesses should evaluate what resources are available to them, including government assistance for waste management infrastructure and private companies that help ensure compliance.
4. Implementation of Waste Reduction Strategies
In addition to the challenges listed above, companies may also struggle with choosing the right waste management strategy for their business. From composting to turning waste into animal feed, there are multiple strategies to reduce food waste that can be explored. That said, companies must choose a solution that best fits their unique goals and compliance requirements.
In addition, in-depth training is required to ensure new waste management programs are successful. If not, employees may not understand the importance of reducing waste or their role in new processes.
5 Tips for Effective Waste Management
How to ensure effective waste management in the food processing industry?
From adopting technology to using food waste audits to measure the success of your program, here are 5 valuable tips for reducing waste.
1. Utilize Food Waste Technology
Food waste technologies can be used to monitor the temperature and humidity levels of storage rooms, track food waste throughout the supply chain, and improve demand forecasting. Technology has also proven valuable in waste management solutions, enabling companies to transform organic waste into other resources and minimize their negative environmental impact.
2. Adopt Circular Economy Principles
With resource depletion being a major consequence of waste, adopting a circular economy allows businesses to transform harmful waste into something beneficial. Take composting, for example. Composting diverts food from landfills and turns it into a nutrient-rich material that benefits the environment, making it a valuable and increasingly popular strategy adopted by households and businesses alike.
By following the 3 Rs of food waste—reduce, reuse, and recycle—businesses can keep valuable resources in circulation and become leaders in sustainability.
3. Improve Quality Control
Implementing robust quality control measures not only enhances product quality but also minimizes waste, improves compliance with regulations, and builds consumer trust in your food products. That said, technology plays an important role in improving quality control, helping companies monitor critical factors such as temperature, pH levels, and contamination risks.
While technology may have a high upfront cost, it can actually save companies money in the long run by reducing financial losses associated with waste.
4. Enhance Packaging
Since every food item is different, companies should consider the unique temperature, humidity, and storage requirements to create packaging that’s tailored to the unique needs of each product. This extends a product’s shelf life, ensures they’re properly protected during transport, and ultimately reduces waste.
Even more, companies can experiment with sustainable materials like edible packaging to minimize the environmental impact of traditional packaging.
5. Measure Success of Program
Companies can perform food waste audits to identify waste sources and quantities in order to create more effective waste management strategies. This can be done at the beginning of strategy planning but also performed regularly to track the progress of your program. With the results of your audit, you can more accurately identify areas for improvement, enabling you to adjust your strategy and achieve sustainability goals.
Benefits of Effective Waste Management
Reducing food waste in the food processing industry has various benefits, including:
- Reduced environmental impact: Remember all the environmental consequences mentioned above? Well, by improving your waste management strategy, you can help reduce pollution, resource depletion, and methane emissions, all of which help build a more sustainable future.
- New product creation: Upcycling ingredients is a great way to create new products and reduce waste. For instance, waste from fruits can be used to make jams, fruit-based vinegars, and fermented products, which can then be sold to increase a business’ profitability.
- Compliance with regulations: By reducing waste in manufacturing and staying up to date with local and federal regulations, you can ensure your company remains compliant in an ever-evolving legal landscape. This helps companies uphold their reputation and avoid fines.
- New revenue stream: Did you know that waste from the food processing industry can actually help you create a new revenue stream? In addition to using food scraps to create new products, you can also use advanced food waste management to generate additional income. For instance, if you choose composting as your waste management solution, you can sell high-quality compost for agricultural applications.
Conclusion
As discussed in this article, waste management in the food processing industry has various obstacles that businesses must overcome. That said, an advanced strategy helps companies of all sizes stay compliant, reduce their environmental footprint, and create more efficient processes.
While new waste management programs may seem intimidating, it’s important to remember that you’re not alone. In addition to government programs and local initiatives, commercial food waste companies like Shapiro facilitate the entire process, ensuring you choose a waste management strategy that works for your unique requirements.
At Shapiro, we’re committed to reducing waste and helping the U.S. reach its national waste reduction goal. If you’re ready to improve your company’s waste management strategy, we’ll create a tailored solution for you.
Contact us today to learn more.
FAQs about Food Waste in the Food Processing Industry
Food processing waste is solid and liquid waste produced in the food processing sector. This typically includes items removed from fruits and vegetables, dairy, slaughterhouse waste, liquid by-products, and wastewater.
There are various strategies small and large businesses can adopt to reduce waste, such as adopting a circular economy, improving quality control, enhancing packaging, and performing food waste audits. Businesses can also enhance food processing waste management with solutions like composting and increased food donations.
Food waste technology represents a key future trend for food waste management, with solutions like artificial intelligence and machine learning helping businesses optimize processes, reduce overproduction, improve inventory management, and minimize financial losses.
The economic impact of food waste is huge, with financial losses extending beyond the wasted food itself to include the water, energy, land, and labor used to produce and process food that’s never consumed.
Effective waste management in the food processing industry—like composting, turning waste into animal feed, and upcycling ingredients—helps businesses reduce waste, contribute to a circular economy, and create a new revenue stream.
Packaging waste contributes to an array of environmental consequences, with non-biodegradable materials being especially harmful. By adopting more sustainable packaging, companies can reduce their environmental footprint and align with growing consumer expectations for eco-friendly solutions.
Advanced technologies help businesses enhance demand forecasting, monitor storage temperature and humidity levels, optimize transportation routes, and more. This helps them reduce food waste while improving overall efficiency.
Baily Ramsey, an accomplished marketing specialist, brings a unique blend of anthropological insight and marketing finesse to the digital landscape. Specializing in educational content creation, she creates content for various industries, with a particular interest in environmental initiatives.
