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Food Waste to Food Production

Food Waste to Food Production

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Food waste is one of the biggest waste streams in Singapore and the amount of food waste generated has grown by around 20% over the last 10 years. In 2019, Singapore generated around 744 million kg of food waste. That is equivalent to 2 bowls of rice per person per day (Towards Zero Waste, n.d.). With minimising food waste and increasing the volume of homegrown produce set as a main objective in the Singapore Green Plan 2030, the Tampines Town Council has launched a precinct-wide sustainability project in hopes of transforming Tampines into an Eco-Town.

The main feature of the Sustainability @ Tampines Park programme is taking in food waste and turning them into compost and fertiliser for vegetables and crops. The circular ecosystem starts with residents donating their food scraps to multiple food collection points across the neighbourhood. Upon collection, these food scraps will be brought to a black soldier fly facility, where the flies will break down the food materials to form compost. Black soldier fly larvae were chosen over earthworms as they decompose at a faster rate, more than 70% that of earthworms.

After decomposition, what is leftover is termed as frass, or the poop, exoskeleton and leftover food from the larvae. The frass will be used as the main source of fertiliser for the vertical high-tech farms built flanking several HDB buildings. The vertical structure is an ingenious means of utilising vertical space in our land-scare city. Leafy vegetables such as chinese spinach and nai bai the common vegetables planted. The residents even attempted to grow rice, which became a huge success following the harvest of the first batch of Temasek rice in February this year.

Readers might worry about the consequences of the flies become pests in the neighbourhood, but the Tampines plan have this covered as well. Before the larvae can morph into pesky flies, they will be fed to an on-suite tilapia farm. It has been proven that black soldier fly larvae is extremely nutritious, rich in lipids and proteins (Lopes et al., 2022), perfect for rearing plump tilapias.

Such sustainable initiatives are clear signs of residents and the city working together to tackle pollution issues such as food waste, as well as push for more green and sustainable movements.

References

Basil. (2020, December 8). Food waste to food production—Sustainability @ Tampines Park is Singapore’s first community-based green initiative. SETHLUI.Com. https://sethlui.com/sustainability-at-tampines-park-singapore-dec-2020/

Lopes, I. G., Yong, J. W., & Lalander, C. (2022). Frass derived from black soldier fly larvae treatment of biodegradable wastes. A critical review and future perspectives. Waste Management, 142, 65–76. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2022.02.007

Asia’s Dirtiest Holy River – Part 2

Asia’s Dirtiest Holy River – Part 2

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In the previous blog post, we looked at how love and devotion, coupled with improper sewage systems and lax regulations, have led to the demise of the river that courses through the world’s largest ancient city. It was clear that the river Ganges was vital to the people who reside near it, but what exactly have the people done to revive the river?

 

Governmental Action

The Holy City of Varanasi, a popular pilgrimage destination

 

 

The Ganges River provides the state with an array of ecosystem services; it is the source of irrigation water for one of the main exports of India: rice. It also possesses great hydroelectric power, and garners economy through tourism, where the holy city of Varanasi alone saw over 300,000 foreign visitors and 5 million domestic tourists annually.

Evidently, the Ganges is an essential nature resource to the state’s economy, which is why there was an attempt to safeguard this resource with the implementation of the Yamuna Action Plan (YAP). This plan was separated into 3 phases. Phase 1, which took place from 1993-2003, aims to eliminate informal sources of waste disposal into the channel through expanding sewage networks and public infrastructures such as toilets. Phase 1 also planned to educate the public on pollutive behaviours. Unfortunately, due to lack of foresight on a population boom, the new infrastructures built were unable to cater to the new 6.7 million, as it was initially planned to support only 3.5 million people. The second phase involves further capacity building, and the start of water testing to check the progress of the action plan. It was found that after a whole 20 years since the plan ensued, dissolved oxygen concentrations remained low and heavy metal percentages are almost the same pre-YAP, indicating meagre success (Singh and Parmar, 2015).

 

Leaving the river alone

It seems that hard engineering methods implemented by the states saw extremely limited improvements, and that perhaps, should not be the direction to look into for a sustainable restorative strategy. To contain the recent outbreak of COVID-19, the Indian government called for a 60-days lockdown, and industries came to a halt. This was when a miracle happened.

Side by side comparison of the Ganges River before and during the COVID-19 lockdown

 

As seen from the above photos, the Ganges River finally ran clear, no longer plagued with phosphate foams that indicated polluted waters. It seemed unbelievable that with just a short 3-month break from constant consumption of industrial waste, the river was able to restore itself to such a healthy state. For this self-restorative function of the river, we will have to thank the various microorganisms that regulated oxidation and reductions of the fecal materials and several metals in the channel. Waters of the Yamuna River saw revivals of dissolved oxygen levels during the lockdown, indicating life in the river (Mohammad et al., 2020).

 

Moving forward

Alas, when the economy is again allowed to run, and industries begin functioning again, the frothy waters return. However, the sight of pure waters of Mother Ganges runs fresh in people’s mind; perhaps seeing the effects of proper pollution control can motivate a stronger urge in mitigating pollution of the river, and return the Ganges back to its initial purifying state that it is revered for.

 

References

Mohammad, A., Kumar, R., & Parveen, S. (2020). Reduction in Water Pollution in Yamuna River due to lockdown under COVID-19 Pandemic.

Singh, V., & Parmar, S. (2015). Water Quality Parameters of River Yamuna in Delhi After 20 Years of the Yamuna Action Plan. International Journal of Science and Nature, 6.

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