Journal of Food Products Marketing

Tackling Food Waste through a Food Systems Perspective

According to a report by the United Nations Environment Programme, in the year 2022, over a billion tons of food was wasted worldwide (UNEP, 2024). Food waste is caused at many steps starting from where food is produced and ending where food is consumed. Hence, existing research on food waste ranges from interventions aimed at reducing food waste closer to the source of food production (O’Connor et al., 2023) to strategies that help reduce consumer food waste through changing behavior (Carvalho, 2022). This stream of research on reducing food waste is multifaceted with researchers proposing many solutions that range from promoting innovations such as upcycled foods (Bhatt et al., 2018; Aschemann-Witzel, 2018), nudges that help reduce food waste behavior (Reynolds et al., 2019), the role of communication in food waste reduction (Olavarria-Key, 2021), crafting acceptance of ugly produce (Mookerjee, 2021; Hartmann et al., 2021), and other targeted marketing strategies aimed at reducing food waste at the consumer level. While there is increasing interest from researchers, there is a lot more that needs to be understood on the way towards halving food waste, as aimed for in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). This special issue at the Journal of Food Products Marketing is focused on research that aims to explore varied interventions throughout the food system that help prevent and minimize food waste as well as introduce more ‘circularity’ in food systems and thus increase sustainability within food systems.

Potential research topics include, but are not limited to:

1. Research on novel foods that salvage food ingredients which would otherwise be wasted
   • Innovations in upcycling of food ingredients and their acceptance by stakeholders (manufacturers, intermediaries, and consumers) across the food supply chain
   • Advances in novel methods of manufacturing food (e.g., 3D printed foods, bio-processed upcycled foods) and acceptance of such foods across the food supply chain, particularly at consumer level.

2. Acceptance of ugly produce and suboptimal foods
   • Research on how to make ugly looking produce more acceptable at all levels of the food supply chain
   • Communication strategies that help promote environmental, societal, and economic benefits of consuming ugly foods
   • Research on shaping acceptance of suboptimal foods such as near expiry or slightly blemished produce and meat

3. Nudges and programs to reduce food waste
   • Questions that pertain to the role of creating a consumption architecture that helps reduce food waste at the household level
   • Research on the efficacy of organized food waste programs in reducing waste behavior
   • Identification of nudging strategies that enable better planning and execution of food consumption and thereby help reduce food waste

4. Role of technology in reducing food waste
   • Research pertaining to the use of technology (digital lists, apps, and AI platforms) in food consumption that helps reduce food waste
   • Questions related to the role of circular business models and websites specifically selling foods with a mission to reduce food waste (e.g., Misfits Market)
   • Questions investigating how the usage of food delivery platforms (e.g., DoorDash, Uber Eats) is related to food waste

5. Demographic and psychographic variables in food waste and food system circularity
   • The role of demographic variables (age, gender, income etc.) in shaping sensitivity towards the food waste problem and its solutions
   • The role of psychographic variables (values, attitudes, lifestyles, systems thinking, etc.) in shaping sensitivity towards the food waste problem and its solutions
   • Research examining complex segmentation strategies in promoting food waste solutions
   • Cross cultural influences in consumers food waste behavior

The list of topics above is indicative and not exhaustive. Conceptual and empirical research articles that expand our understanding of how to tackle food waste at various levels of the food consumption cycle will be considered. The Guest Editors of this special issue are keen to consider both conceptual and empirical articles on the topic of food waste mitigation.

Submissions will receive blind peer review. Author guidelines can be found online at the Journal of Food Products Marketing website.

Please direct specific questions to the editors – Sidd Bhatt (shb5170@psu.edu), Jessica Aschemann-Witzel (jeaw@mgmt.au.dk), Jonathan Deutsch (jdeutsch@drexel.edu).

References

• United Nations Environment Programme. (2024). Food Waste Index Report 2024. https://wedocs.unep.org/handle/20.500.11822/45230 
• O'Connor, J., Skeaff, S., Bremer, P., Lucci, G., & Mirosa, M. (2023). A critical review of on-farm food loss and waste: future research and policy recommendations. Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems, 38, e24.
• Simoes, J., Carvalho, A., & de Matos, M. G. (2022). How to influence consumer food waste behavior with interventions? A systematic literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 373, 133866.
• Bhatt, S., Lee, J., Deutsch, J., Ayaz, H., Fulton, B., & Suri, R. (2018). From food waste to value‐added surplus products (VASP): Consumer acceptance of a novel food product category. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 17(1), 57-63.
• Reynolds, C., Goucher, L., Quested, T., Bromley, S., Gillick, S., Wells, V. K., ... & Jackson, P. (2019). Consumption-stage food waste reduction interventions–What works and how to design better interventions. Food policy, 83, 7-27.
• Olavarria-Key, N., Ding, A., Legendre, T. S., & Min, J. (2021). Communication of food waste messages: The effects of communication modality, presentation order, and mindfulness on food waste reduction intention. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 96, 102962.