Producers

Producers

Total Surplus Food  in 2023 by Producers


See more in the Insights Engine
See more in the Insights Engine

Optimize The Harvest

  • Sell surplus products to a variety of buyers, including upcycling companies, and through online marketplaces to expand reach, access new markets, and increase sales opportunities.
  • Establish advance purchase agreements with buyers to support demand planning, ensuring a more predictable supply and reducing waste from overproduction.
  • Adopt automated systems that enable 24/7 operations as well as ensure precise planting, harvesting, and sorting to meet SKU specifications set by buyers, reducing heavy reliance on manual labor.
  • Adopt precision agriculture technologies for soil monitoring, crop health analysis, and predictive analytics, including weather forecasting and yield predictions, to optimize harvests and minimize losses.
  • Collaborate with innovative companies that apply cold plasma technology to seeds to improve quality, reduce pathogens, and develop crop resilience to abiotic stressors like drought and extreme heat, reducing loss and increasing marketable yields.

Enhance Product Distribution

  • Use technology innovations to improve the flow of information – such as road and traffic conditions, as well as timing of pickup and delivery – to optimize the movement of food.
  • Coordinate across the sector to develop shared economies for idle assets, such as cold storage and transportation, to expand accessibility at lower cost and resource impact.

Refine Product Management

  • Establish and use aggregation centers that provide adequate storage and preservation options, such as cooling chambers, to address cold chain disruptions.

Maximize Product Utilization

  • Implement active packaging solutions to extend the shelf life of produce, along with intelligent packaging that provides real-time freshness indicators.
  • Collaborate with processors, buyers, and other stakeholders to create food products from typically discarded field byproducts, like edible and nutrient-rich leaves and stems, and build demand for these products.

Reshape Consumer Environments

  • Explore and promote food product trends that make use of farm surplus and alternative specification items, such as cauliflower rice.
  • Communicate the variety of product types (size, shape, and color variety) to consumers through in-person, virtual, and written engagement opportunities.

Strengthen Food Rescue

  • Participate in pilots of real and near-time data sharing technology that are informed by the type, quantity, condition, location, etc. of products nearing expiration to address time-sensitive food rescue opportunities.
  • Build direct relationships with food recovery organizations and gleaners to have greater options to capture donatable product in the moment it’s available.
  • Ensure grower and staff knowledge of liability protections for direct donation.

Recycle Anything Remaining

  • Ensure packhouse culls are sent to highest use, exploring alternative markets and upcycled products first, then livestock feed, and finally anaerobic digestion or composting.
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