Mexican develops app to reduce food waste

The Ecubi project , a web platform and mobile application that links agricultural producers with wholesale customers without intermediaries was one of the winners of the 2018 Unitec Award for Technological Innovation for Social Development .

The project, which aims to improve the food supply chain and reduce waste by fifty percent while promoting fair trade among local farmers, was developed by Aníbal Pineda Guzmán, a graduate of the Technological University of Mexico (Unitec) .

In a statement from the University, Aníbal Pineda, who majored in Mechatronic Engineering , claimed that around 20 million tons of food are wasted year in Mexico every year, which could be enough to feed more than seven million people. He informed that most of the products wasted are of agricultural origin; mostly fruits, vegetables, and meat.

According to Pineda, there are four levels of food waste, the first is at the production level; the second, distribution; the third, commercialization, and the fourth, consumption, "which occurs when we are at home and realize that some of our food has expired.”

Based on data from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) , in Mexico, the largest amount of perishable food waste is generated during distribution, notably in the transport chain, due to uncooled or overloaded shipments, inadequate loading and unloading, inappropriate packaging, lack of quality standards, among other reasons.

Ecubi promotes fair trade of agricultural products, allowing small and medium food businesses to locate the best option to acquire their raw materials while providing security through the traceability of products and even filtering producers by certifications, quantity, and quality of their merchandise.

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