RESEARCH AND ANALYTICS

Ever wondered how much food is wasted globally? According to the UNEP's Food Waste Index Report 2021, global food waste in 2019 amounted to 931 mn tons, which is 17% of total food produced in the world! And households comprise 61% of this waste, well above the food service (26%) and retail (13%) sectors. In terms of per capita per year, households are responsible for 74 kg of the 121 kg food wasted globally! Among the top 10 countries ranked by mn tons of food wasted, Australia wastes the most food per capita (102 kg/year) while Russia (33 kg/year) wastes the least.

Avoiding food wastage can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, cut unnecessary pollution, reduce global hunger, and save money that can be channelised elsewhere. Under SDG 12.3, the UN tackles both food losses and food waste, and by 2030, it aims to "halve per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses".

Now, 2030 is less than a decade away and a persistent pandemic can only exacerbate the hunger problem. If we want to create a serious difference by then, focused supply-side investments, ongoing grass-root level initiatives and improving global awareness around food waste are the need of the hour!

The joy and pride of owning something unique —a painting, a diamond, a heritage jewelry piece, a sculpture — has its own investor audience around the world, and auction houses such as Christie's and Sotheby's are leading this market for various years. As technology continues to penetrate hitherto unknown areas, one such area is the ability to digitize such collectibles using NFTs - or non-fungible tokens.

Although NFTs have been around for a while, their popularity has picked up significantly of late. Basically, these enable the creation of a digital, authentic, and unique certificate of ownership for both tangible or intangible assets (artwork, collectible, digital card, video, real estate, etc.) and this certificate can be bought or sold. NFTs are one-of-a-kind cryptographic tokens, much like Bitcoin or Ethereum, that are recorded on the blockchain. However, unlike other cryptocurrencies, they cannot be exchanged and hence are called 'non-fungible'. Interestingly, the artist/creator gets a percentage of the revenue every time the artwork is sold by the existing owner.

Now, a new asset that seems to be included in NFTs is .... viral memes! And mind you, they are raking in the moolah! The highest grossing meme-turned NFT till date is 'Disaster Girl' which was sold for $573,136 at an auction. Other memes to have been sold as NFTs in recent times include Nyan Cat ($515k), Overly Attached Girlfriend ($460k), Grumpy Cat ($100k), Keyboard Cat ($100k), Scumbag Steve ($57k), Bad Luck Brian ($45k), Leave Britney Alone ($43k) and Success Kid ($35k) among others. So, what do you think? Are NFTs here to stay or are they just a tech fad?

Single-use-plastic, or SUP, is one of the greatest challenges to sustainable living as it is hardly recycled and generally either burned, buried in landfills, or discarded directly into the environment. About 98% of the world’s single-use-plastic uses virgin polymer as a raw material, which is produced from fossil fuels and contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions.

According to ‘The Plastic Waste Makers Index’ report by The Minderoo Foundation, the top 20 out of ~300 polymer producers globally account for more than 50% of global SUP waste! In terms of consumption, populous countries contribute the most to SUP waste in absolute terms, but the per capita numbers paint a contrasting picture. In 2019, Australia generated the most SUP waste per capita (59kg), followed by the US (53kg), South Korea and the UK (44kg each), which is in stark contrast to China (18 kg) and India (4 kg).

Amid this already grim situation, the global production capacity of virgin polymer used for SUP production is expected to grow by >30% over the next five years. It is high time the world reconsiders and changes its SUP consumption, governments intervene with stricter regulations and companies focus on technologies that can produce recycled polymers from plastic waste.