Andrew Yeo Jung Yeat, Chloe Lau Jia Yee, Eng Wee Long, Kong Qi Herng, Tan Jia Le Damien
Academic Advisor: Mr. Lim Cheng Puay
The issue of food waste is detrimental to the environment and “if food waste were a country, it would be the third largest producer of greenhouse gases in the world” (Royte, 2016). Furthermore, an estimated 40% of the food losses occur at the final consumer level consumed (Gustavsson, Cederberg, Sonesson, Otterdijk, & Meybeck, 2011). This issue can thus be mitigated through the collective effort of individual consumers. As consumers do not realize the level of food waste generated (De Coverly, McDonagh, O’Malley, & Patterson, 2008), it is therefore imperative to raise awareness on this issue and inculcate a culture of recycling food waste. Our project explored households’ awareness of food wastage and their methods of managing food waste through our survey on consumers (of various ages). 85% of the respondents discard their fruit peels instead of recycling them. In response to this, we conducted workshops to teach consumers how to produce a food enzyme solution. We reached out to RVRC residents and the members of the public and educated them on the uses of food enzymes and the method of developing a food enzyme solution. Results from the workshops showed that than 97% of our participants (n=76) were willing to recycle their fruit peels. The participants also became more cognizant of the existing food wastage issues. Moreover, respondents were willing to share what they learned from our workshops with their family and friends. Thus, this suggests the success of our outreach as participants are spreading the idea of garbage enzyme through word of mouth. In conclusion, we have successfully met our project objective of encouraging households to use garbage enzyme as a substitute for commercial cleaning agents, thereby demonstrating the possibility of up-scaling garbage enzyme making and thereby further spreading this idea to more people.
Keywords: Food waste; upcycling; waste management