Innovation in Post-Harvest Loss & Food Waste Reduction Consortium

The Innovation in Post-Harvest Loss & Food Waste Reduction Consortium is a collaborative research effort to prevent food and nutrient loss and waste and promote global food security.

Generating Health-Agriculture Nexus Solutions

Program Contact

Grants Team
grants@foundationfar.org

Development Contact

Catherine Maxwell
cmaxwell@foundationfar.org

Consortium Research Focus

The Innovation in Post-Harvest Loss & Food Waste Reduction Consortium promotes audacious research that provides the tools and strategies to preserve nutrients, advance food security and build efficient food systems.

Research projects focus on:

Advancing a common, collaborative research agenda focused on deploying member expertise across the global food system
Enhancing the capacity of the next generation to deliver nutritious foods and ensure food security
Developing practical approaches to measure value chain loss and waste
Increasing efficiencies in the global food system to sustainably preserve nutrients
Achieving sustained, scalable implementation of methods to preserve, process, package and transport nutritious foods

Why the Consortium is Needed

Food loss and waste is a global problem that negatively impacts the bottom line of businesses and farmers, wastes limited resources, contributes to food insecurity and damages the environment.

We launched this consortium in 2019 with a $2.78 million contribution, which is matched by consortium participants for a $5.56 million investment in pioneering food loss and waste research.

The consortium includes strategic public-private partnerships that bring together global thought leaders and experts with industry and other organizations. Together, participants address social, economic and environmental impacts from food loss and waste. The consortium works collaboratively to increase adoption of the YieldWise Initiative model, a project to reduce food loss in developing nations and food waste in developed markets.

The consortium also provides farmers across the globe with technology and strategies to use resources efficiently, allowing farmers to gain more value from their crops. These technologies and strategies stimulate local economic growth and improve access to affordable, healthy food.

In addition to developing strategies to reduce food waste and loss, the consortium builds the academic and entrepreneurial capacity of the next generation of scientists. The consortium pairs researchers and students with private and public sectors professionals for mentorship and training.

For more information, visit the Innovation in Post-Harvest Loss & Food Waste Reduction Consortium website.

Consortium Partners

The Consortium convenes diverse thought leaders from public, private and academic spheres who are changing the way we are preventing food loss and waste and ensuring food security.

The participants are Iowa State University, USA; Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana; The Rockefeller Foundation, USA; Stellenbosch University, South Africa; University of Maryland, USA; University of Nairobi, Kenya; University of São Paulo, Brazil; the Volcani Center, Israel; Wageningen University and Research, Netherlands; and Zamorano University, Honduras.