Research and analysis: Rescue of edible surplus food

Attitudes of supermarkets and street markets toward the donation of the perishable food SD5018 Research and Analysis for Design 2018/19 Tutor :Thomas Fischer Group members: - Wang Jianyi 18090449G - Wu Tianjing 18085322G

- Chen Da 18092031G - Chou Ting-yang

- Jiang Yunshan 18089922G

- Hao Xiaotong 18090815G

CONTENTS 03 Abstract 04

09

Introduction

Research Gap 09 Objective 10 Hypothesis

07

11

Literature Review

Methods

07 Food waste Situation in other countries and areas 08 Current Situation in Hong Kong

11 Data Acquisition 11 Unstructured Interview 11 Email Interview 11 Data Analysis

11

17

Account of Study Performed

Finding / Result

11 Object 1: Staff in food recycling NGO 12 Object 2: Street market Vendor 12 Object 3: Seller in Youkejia supermarket 12 Object 4: Consumer service division of parknshop supermarket 12 Object 5: Economist

12 Discussion 12 NGO 13 STREET MARKET 14 SUPER MARKET 14 Staff in supermarket 15 Economy Student 16 Economist

17 Business view 17 Trade patterns 18 Social responsibilities 18 tential risk

18 Conclusion 19 Reference Appendix

Abstract Food waste is currently a serious worldwide crisis, especially in the developed countries and regions. It intensifies problems of unbalanced food supply chains, climate change and the loss of wildlife and their natural habitats (World Wildlife Fund, 2018).

Food waste can be found in the entire food supply chain, from collecting food in farms, distribution and storage, to consumers’ home. (Goldenberg, 2016) Improving this condition within the near future presents a significant challenge.

According to a study of the Hong Kong government, the food waste of commercial and industrial sources has been doubled within 2002 and 2012. (Environmental Protection Department of Hong Kong, 2018) Several NGOs have observed this trend and started to collect surplus food from these sources and to distribute it to those in need. Although some positive developments have shown, big commercial and industrial companies’ attitude towards donating food seems to be conservative due to multiple considerations including liability and cost issues. To shed a light on this situation, we present in the following our investigation into the relation between business scale and businesses’ attitudes towards excess food donation. We have conducted a survey of staff of Hong Kong-based NGOs experienced in collecting excess food from both large food store chains and from individual wet market vendors. Based on our NGO staff survey findings, we also conducted interviews with staff of large food store chains and wet market vendors, probing their considerations and actions with regards to excess food donation . We conclude with a comparison of two different kinds of businesses, juxtaposing the attitudes on excess food donation they expressed, and suggesting directions for further study.

General Terms: Research, Design Keywords: Food waste, donation, NGOs, Supermarket, street vendor

03

Introduction

who are still being suffered from hunger in 2017 (World Health Organization, 2018).

This study investigates the current food waste situation in Hong Kong and explores how different stakeholders such as chain-supermarkets, hawkers in fresh (local “wet”) markets and NGOs understand and deal with the issue of food waste. Based on a review of related literature, we identify food waste as a serious problem in both the local and the worldwide context. In order to examine the extent of this challenge in Hong Kong, and to inform the search for solutions, we have conducted surveys of local supermarkets, wet markets and conducted site observations at an NGO (Food Angel) aiming to alleviate Hong Hong’s food waste. Based on the outcomes of this field work, we have conducted semistructured interviews with the volunteers of the NGO to examine how various stakeholders perceive the problem of local food waste and how they attempt to address this problem from their respective perspectives.

Food Waste and Water Scarcity Food waste is not just referring to the waste of ‘ready to eat’ food, it also includes the waste of valuable natural resources that have been used for agriculture production such as water and soil.

These resources including fresh water are being more and more valuable due to climate change and industrial pollution, especially in the fast-growing industrial regions such South East Asia. The research conducted by WWF indicates that there are more than 66 trillion gallons of fresh water is wasted during the process of food production. (World Wildlife Fund, 2018) As the threats of climate change and the lack of fresh water resources has made the problem of food waste became urgent and significant.

Food Waste and Greenhouse Effect Meanwhile, climate change is another challenge brought by the problem of food waste. In many countries and regions, it is common to sending wasted food to the landfill. This process produces methane, a greenhouse gas which is 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide (Hamburg, 2018). If it releases to the air, it will absorb the sun’s heat and extreme the climate change. Each year wasted food emits more than 3.3 billion tons of methane into environment.

(World Wildlife Fund, 2018) There is an emerging need for farming land to cope with raising demand for food consumption. The expansion of farming land has caused direct conflict between human society and wildlife (World Wildlife Fund, 2018).

Food Waste and Other Global Issues Food Waste and Hunger Food waste is now a global issue as it has brought various problems in different aspects such as climate change and global food supply chain. One of the most serious problems is hunger. Right now, global food production is enough to nourish everyone on the earth. However, nearly 1/3 of the total food production is wasted before it can be consumed.

There is a significant relation between food waste and the problem of hunger. According to the World Health Organization, there are around 821 million people

04

Food Waste from Farm to Dining Table

Although consumers have spent money on the food they have bought, there are still lots of opportunities that the food will not be consumed at the end.

People nowadays tend to buy goods that they don’t necessarily need due to the improved living standard.

Many families buy food more than they need and cannot eat all of them before the expiry date.

Food Waste in Farm From the farm to the dining table, food waste can be found in different stages of the food supply chain.

Firstly, when vegetable and fruits are being harvested in the farm, many of them maybe disposed due to their unappealing appearance even they are totally fine in terms of their quality and freshness. According to the study of the UN, about 17% of food grown in North America is lost or wasted in the farm before they have been delivered to the retail market (Goldenberg, 2016).

On the other hand, some kinds of food such as milk and yoghurt are always wasted due to reliance of label of expiry date. When they are stored inside the fridge, generally will keep fresh from one to three weeks after the expiry date. In the frozen condition it can be stored for even a month. However, the best-by date is normally shorter than the real expiry date due to the safety issue. Most of consumers tend to throw away food once it passes the valid date even though it is still edible (Goldenberg, 2016).

Food Waste in Distribution Next stage of the process is to deliver the food to warehouses. Most of time this process doesn’t cause much waste of food, but once there is something wrong, like wrong temperature setting, it usually causes huge spoil. Even though the food has been delivered to the warehouse and stored, it doesn’t mean it will finally be distributed to retail spots such as restaurants or supermarkets. If there are no enough orders before the valid time of food, in the end this food will directly be buried in landfill. About 16% of food in North America is lost during distribution, according to UN estimates (Goldenberg, 2016).

Scope of Research Region / Country Different countries and regions are facing different issues about food. In developed countries, food waste become more and more serious. By contrast, developing countries are facing hunger issue. At the same time, governments in different countries also implement different policies to solve the problem from different angles. In order to understand the situation deeper, we choose Hong Kong as our case study as it is more possible for our team to conduct further researches.

Food Waste in Stores and Restaurants The next stage of food waste is in stores and restaurants. In order to display perfect food to consumers, stores and restaurants tend to throw away editable food once it is bruised or nearly expired.

Source of Waste According to the study from Hong Kong government, among the food waste disposed of daily, some

Food Waste in Household In addition, waste can be also seen in household.

05

809 tonnes were generated from commercial and industrial (C&I) sources such as restaurants, hotels, supermarkets, wet markets, food production and processing industries (Environmental Protection Department of Hong Kong, 2018). In recent years, the amount of food waste arising from the C&I sectors has increased steadily: from less than 400 tonnes per day in 2002 to over 800 tonnes per day in 2012 （fig. 1).

low-income families lack reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food" (Chan, 2016).

It is obvious that businesses can give far more food to those in need, but they don’t. One of the reasons may be there is a lack of law that protect the donating objectives. "Liability of businesses is commonly cited as the reason not to donate. Managers always like to tell of how some stores used to donate until they got sued" (Chan, 2016).

Fig. 1. Food Waste data (from the C&I).

It has caught attention from local NGOs such as Food Angel and Food Grace. Many food recycling NGOs were established around 2010, asking for donation of food from supermarkets, wet markets and others.

Food Angel, one of the leading food recycling NGOs in Hong Kong was established in 2011, has collected 2714 tonnes of food from 254 partners and distributed food boxes to nearly 3.4 million people in need from 2016 to 2017 (Angel, 2017 and Fig. 2). The statistics looks impressive, however, according to South China Morning Post, "in 2016 businesses still throw out HK$60 million worth of food yearly when almost half of

Fig. 2. Food Angel Figures.

Focused Group This phenomenon has inspired our team to conduct the research on attitude of food donation of different businesses. Whether the scale of business and the willingness of donating food have correlation.

To narrow down our research, we focus on the comparison between supermarket and wet market as both of business are similar in the function for consumers but different in the scale.

06

Literature Review

further promote the law to Europe, taking the lead in launching a "treasure revolution" around the world (Chrisafis, 2016).

Food waste Situation in other countries Food waste is a big problem in France. Garbage bins in homes, school cafeterias, supermarkets, etc. are filled with food that can be eaten. According to solid data from the Environmental and Energy Control Administration (ADEME), on average, every Frenchman throws away 20 kilograms of food a year, including 7 kilograms of unopened food and 13 kilograms of leftovers and uneaten vegetables and fruits (Fig. 3). As a consequence, France wastes 1.2 million tons of food every year.

In the U.S., according to federal government data, about 30% to 40% of food is wasted every year. In 2014, about one in seven Americans was suffering hunger. In 2016, Starbucks announced their plan to achieve avoid wasting food in the next five years, and to donate 100% if its unsold food from all branches to charity non-non-governmental organization (Cassara, 2017).

In the UK, the country’s first “food-waste” supermarket has recently appeared. It sells food that has been discarded by supermarkets – tomatoes, olive oil, brand-name chocolates, cakes... The organisation “Real Junk Food Project”, which has a supermarket for food, writes on the website: “The leftovers are absolutely suitable for human consumption.” The founder of this organization said that food would not be disposed simply because it was “expired”. All foods were in compliance with environmental health regulations and were safely transported and stored.

(Harton, 2016) They will also personally smell or try to eat, and never sell what they think is not suitable for eating. Food that has not been discarded in the past has been sent to food banks; However, the British newspaper The Guardian has pointed out that poor children have a greater chance of suffering from obesity – because food banks only accept food that does not expire too soon, such as full canned additives. The food in the supermarket is including fresh food such as vegetables and fruits. These foods come from a number of global supermarket chains,

Fig. 3. Food waste situation of Frenchman In 2015, France passed a law prohibiting supermarkets from abandoning or destroying unexpired leftovers, making it the first case in the world. The local food bank has been preparing for a large number of donated foods for months. It is expected that these donated foods can produce millions of meals a year for those in need. Concerned organisations hope to lobby the EU to follow and

07

waste has become an urgent issue in Hong Kong.

as well as food banks, restaurants, cafes, events, etc.

The goods include vegetables, juices, desserts, fruits, bread, salads and so on. All food is sold in free pricing and customers can pay with money, volunteer work or skills.

In October 2012 Oxfam launched "GROW campaign" in Hong Kong, it aims to build a future that no one suffering from hungry. Oxfam plans to localise this initiative to help people in Hong Kong who need food assistance.

Current Situation in Hong Kong

The food expenditure of poor households in Hong Kong accounts for a large part of their income.

Recently, many food banks have indicated that the number of poor people who requesting assistance is gradually increasing, so these institutions are calling on companies to donate more food to meet the growing needs of the poor. In the food industry, it is inevitable that it will produce surplus food. Oxfam estimates that the food industry has a good chance of redistributing surplus food, and some food companies have begun to donate to the food banks the surplus food they produced during their operations. Therefore, Oxfam hopes to encourage food companies to donate food to create a win-win situation: on the one hand, reducing leftovers and greenhouse gas emissions, and on the other hand, benefiting the local poor.

There is a large amount of food waste generated every day in Hong Kong. According to the Environmental Protection Department’s 2011 figure 1, about 3,584 metric tons of food waste is discarded every day, accounting for 39.8% of municipal solid waste (Fig. 4).

Fig. 4. Municipal solid waste

From Oxfam Surplus food report published on Jan 2013, the vast majority (92.6%) of food companies agree that corporate social responsibility is an important business philosophy for modern companies, and most (78.4%) will also use or reduce the amount of food left into the company’s corporate social responsibility. 60.5% of food companies have taken measures to use or reduce leftovers, and 42.9% of them will use or reduce leftovers to be included in corporate social responsibility. The measures taken

A large number of discarded kitchen wastes have had a negative impact on the Hong Kong environment.

The three landfills in Hong Kong are estimated to be saturated in 2014, 2016 and 2018 respectively.

The heavy burden of daily kitchen waste will speed up the depletion of landfills. In addition, food waste disposed of at landfills will also emit large amounts of greenhouse gases, which will seriously affect air quality and increase global warming. Therefore, food

08

by the food companies to make full use of or reduce the surplus food mainly include: “price reduction promotion” (45.8%); “distribution to staff” (44.1%), “donation to non-profit making or social service agencies” (39.3%), as well as “regular review and measurement of production/purchasing activities” (31.0%).

The majority (65.4%) of the food companies that donated surplus food believe that “benefit people in need in society” is the main reason for donating food to non-profit-making or social service organization.

Most (67.7%) food companies did not encounter any difficulties in donating food. Among the 23.3% food companies that encountered difficulties, the main difficulties were "fear of legal risks related to food safety" (70.3%) and "it is difficult to afford additional transportation costs " (39.4%). 74.1% of food companies currently do not donate food to non-profit or social service agencies.

The main reasons for not making such donations include: "Do not know the channels for donating food" (46.0%), "Fear of legal risks related to food safety" (29.7%), and "Insufficient resources and manpower" (28.2%) (Oxfam,2013,p.76).

For food donation, more than half (56.2%) of food companies rarely know or never know about how food donation is operated, only 13.8% reported they are familiar with food donation. 25.9% of food companies indicated that they currently have the habit of donating food to non-profit or social service agencies (Fig. 5).

Research Gap Objectives Considering the problem of the dealing way of food surplus in supermarkets, there are two corresponding problems: daily disposal of surplus food produced by supermarkets and wet markets and food demand of hungry people in the society, we set out our research from consider the reasons and motivations behind the attitude and methods of disposal of surplus food of wet market and supermarket. This paper studies the existing food treatment schemes of supermarkets, and further explores the corresponding reason behind operating mechanism to understand the status and problems of surplus treatment, which could provide more possibilities for the development of the treatment

Fig. 5. Food Donation Awareness The three main types of donated foods are vegetables, fruits and cereals. Food companies donate an average of 12 food items per year to non-profit or social service agencies. The average percentage of food donated by the total food production/purchasing volume per year was 3.2%, while the average cash value of donated food per year was 9,615 Hong Kong Dollar. Most of the food donated is in the case of "approaching best taste date" and "poor appearance".

09

Attitude of Traditional Market Towards Donation On the other hand, traditional market is another form of businesses which sales similar goods, but in a smaller scale. In our assumption, traditional market also adopts basic profit strategy even though their business models are simpler, compared with supermarket. Some parts of the profit strategies, such as accounting quantities of imported goods and the loss of disposing of perishable food, will directly affect their attitude towards donating food to NGOs. Therefore, when traditional market vendors are asked to donate perishable food, the points they consider are like the points that supermarket consider.

of these problems. Therefore, our research objectives focus on comparing the attitudes of supermarkets and street markets toward the donation of the perishable food and analysis the reason of it.

Hypothesis Attitude of Supermarket Towards Donation In order to understand the industry of supermarket, we are considering this area from three aspect of the supermarket: the supermarket formats, the commodity management and the supermarket operations. The classification of the supermarket has department stores, supermarkets, large-scale comprehensive supermarkets and convenience stores. The commodities run by these three types of supermarket are all focusing on the daily consumer goods products. In this case, the profit source of supermarkets rely on commodity sales quantities.

Therefore, the common profit strategy adopted by the supermarket industry is to maximise sales quantities while minimising operational cost. Accordingly, with regards to the disposal of surplus food, supermarkets try to reduce operating costs as much as possible based on profit considerations, and usually respond with the way of labour saving.

The different attitudes between both are due to different processes of decision making. Most of the business modes of traditional markets are family based, which means it is easy for NGOs to find the boss in the booths. If NGOs can talk directly to the bosses, it will largely enhance the chance of successfully collecting food. By contrast, it is difficult to directly approach the seniors who have right to make decisions in the supermarkets. NGOs usually approach employees at the grass-roots level in the supermarkets at first. Through the communication channels inside the companies, NGOs might eventually get the chance to talk to the seniors who have right to decide whether to donate or not. It is a much longer process compared with the cases in traditional market. That is the main reason why supermarkets with large business scales tend to be more conservative to donate food to NGOs; traditional markets with smaller business scales are more willing to donate.

At the same time, supermarket enterprises attach great importance to their own corporate reputation and therefore ensure the quality of products they sell stringently. Supermarket business organisations mostly adopt the large-scale chain operation mode, which results in difficulties to carry out the risky decision on the disposal of surplus food commodities.

In this case, supermarkets are not willing to take the risk of liability for food donation.

10

Methods

Email Interview We emailed Food Angel for some question on their mode of operation, and ParknShop supermarket for their consumer service division. But unfortunately, they refused to answer our question. Food Angel suggested us to do voluntary work if we want to know more about them.

The disadvantage of email interviews is that interviewees tend to be brief in writing. But if the interviewees coordinate well, email interviewing can generate rich data.

Data Acquisition We conduct qualitative research with open-ended answers to collect data with secondary research: Literature/press of current situation, case studies of NGOs and worldwide solutions, and also the semi-structured interview with NGOs, supermarket managers, and street market vendors.

Unstructured Interview

Data Analysis

We made an unstructured interview with Food Angel’s staff during we did voluntary work in their kitchen.

We also interviewed with supermarket employee and street market vendors.

Pros: a. We have a better rapport with the interviewee, so some more complex issues which did not seem relevant before the interview can be probed. b. Due to the relaxed and informal environment, more valid responses can be created during the interview. c. There is an equal relationship between us and the interviewee. So they can understand our perspective in a language that is natural to them.

Cons: a. It’s time-consuming because of no prearranged questions asked during the interview. b. When the interview with street market vendors and NGO staff, it’s more like an everyday conversation, so we easily bring bias into the discussion. c. Because the interviewees can say what they like freely, the data collected is prone to digression and unpredictable, thereby making it hard to analyse.

From NGO and other secondary research, we summarize the current situation of food surplus and extract core information.

First, we transcribe the audio recordings and field notes into text. And then we interpret, compare and visualize key findings using charts and diagrams.

At last, from the previous analyses, we derive explanations for patterns observed and develop a model that describes causal relationships or explanations of our observations.

Account of Study Performed Object 1: Staff in food recycling NGO Introduction: In Hong Kong, several NGOs are dedicated to reducing food waste. One of the most powerful NGOs is Food Angel, who recycles the raw surplus food and process them into food boxes and distributes them for free.

11

In order to know more about the background information of both street markets and supermarkets considering the donation of surplus perishable food, our team decided to work in Food Angel as volunteers and interview at least 3 staff members while working.

The first person we interviewed was a buddy who led us into the preparation room. He then introduced their organisation and reminded us of the precautions of volunteer jobs.

The other two we interviewed were the employees responsible for sorting and cutting raw food materials.

Object 4: Consumer service division of ParknShop supermarket Introduction: Most of the donated food are from ParknShop. Everyday Food Angel staffs collect goods from about 150 stores. We planned to know about their donation attitude through interviewing a higherlevel manager of ParknShop, so we contacted the consumer service division via Email. However, there was no reply from ParknShop.

Object 5: Economist

Object 2: Street market Vendor

Introduction: Interview economist is a backup plan in case we could not get any information from supermarket.

Introduction: Link is a street market management company that operates and manages many street markets in Hong Kong. It has cooperated with Food Angel and encouraged the vendors to donate perishable food to that NGO. To understand the attitude towards donating food to Food Angel, we also planned to directly ask about the vendor’s attitudes toward donation.

By browsing website pages of Link, we targeted one street market, called Lok Fu street market, to carry out our research. We interviewed fruit vendors, vegetable vendors and meat vendors there.

Discussion NGO We intended to investigate more details about NGOs’ attitudes towards both street markets and supermarkets when asking them to donate perishable food.

As we knew from online sources, Food Angel is a Hong Kong food rescue and food assistance program launched in 2011 with the mission of "WASTE NOT, HUNGER NOT". This NGO rescues edible surplus food from supermarkets, wet markets, wholesalers, school canteens and other organizations. Following strict safety protocols, the rescued food will then be prepared as nutritious hot meals in their central kitchen and be redistributed to serve the

Object 3: Seller in Youkejia supermarket I n t r o d u c t i o n : Yo u k e j i a i s a w e l l - k n o w n c h a i n supermarket in mainland China with well-established operations. To compare the differences of attitudes toward food donation between supermarket and street market, we interviewed one seller of the supermarket.

12

underprivileged communities in Hong Kong.

of their street markets. Most of the collected food is perishable food like the vegetable, meat..."

Before we went to Food Angel, we knew they would redistribute the food to underprivileged communities after processing. But we were curious about how they find out the ideal receivers after food-preparation.

We thought there must be some difficulties during this period. This worker told us, "We collaborate with the community centers, delivering the cooked meal and food bag (contain almost expired vegetable and cookies) to them. They are in charge of delivering food to those in need. Some of our staffs are the social worker as well. They work together with those community centers."

So we selected Food Angel as our target NGO. We then emailed them, expecting to get more details on their mode of operation, but unfortunately, they refused to answer our questions. Instead, they suggested us to do voluntary work if we want to know more about them. To continue our investigation, we applied for their voluntary work in Lai Chi Kok, Kowloon.

During the work in Food Angel, one of their workers shared his experience with us about collecting remaining food in collaboration with supermarkets. He said, “Most of our goods are from ParknShop. Each day we collect these goods from about 150 stores.

Every year the number of stores increases slightly.

These goods are diverse, from fresh food like the vegetable, meat to cans, rice, cookies. All of them are almost expired and need to be eaten as soon as possible. But actually they don’t donate all of their surplus food to us, the amount they donate just makes up a small part of their leftover, which means most of the food is still wasted. Maybe the main purpose of donation is just to show their corporate social responsibility (CSR).”

Through one-day voluntary work in Food Angel, we found that supermarkets and street markets are both willing to donate perishable food to NGOs. But compared to the street markets, the amount supermarket donate just makes up a small part of their leftover, which means they concern more about their own benefit and profits. On the other hand, the potential liability is also an essential factor that donors worry about. Donating perishable goods to NGOs can improve supermarket’s social reputation, but concerns like food safety would make them proceed with caution.

We also want to know whether they collect remaining food from street markets and whether it is more difficult than collecting from supermarkets. This worker said "We also collect food from Link. Link is a street market management company. At first, we contacted this company seeking for permission of collecting food from the street markets they manage.

Now Link allows us to collect food after 7 pm in some

STREET MARKET From the previous study, we noticed that Food Angel has cooperated with Link Company to recycle the perishable food from the street markets. The staff from Food Angel described that they contacted Link Company for permission of collecting food from their street markets, then Link allows NGO’s staffs to

13

collect food after 7 pm in part of their street markets.

In order to know the attitude towards food donation of those vendors, a field research at Lok Fu street market was arranged.

to deal with deteriorated food but also contribute to the society.

From the interview, three findings are concluded: 1. Though the street market is managed by Link Company, vendors have the right to donate food or keep it, therefore it is impossible to know the donation attitude from the staffs in the supermarket because they have no direct access. 2. Most of the vendors are willing to donate because it is pleasant to help more people with unsold food rather than throw the food away. 3. Dealing with deteriorated food will cost a lot of time and money, they prefer to let the NGO staffs take the unsold food away.

Since the main types of perishable food that NGOs collect from the street markets are fruit, vegetable, and meat, we selected vendors of these food types to interview. Their were very friendly throughout the interviews. We purchased some of their goods to appreciate the time they spent for the interviews, while they sold us their goods at a very cheap price.

The fruit vendor shared his operating approach to reduce waste and promote sales. On one hand, they start sale promotion after 3 pm and sell even cheaper after 6 pm, which will attract many customers in the afternoon. On the other hand, if the food cannot be sold after 7 pm, they will keep the non-perishable food and donate the perishable food to Food Angel, or ask the customer to take it away at a super cheap price.

The interview result is close to the hypothesis that vendors are generous to donate food and friendly to accept interview. However, compared with the proud of charity, the vendors concern more about the expense of dealing with perishable goods.

SUPERMARKET

The vegetable vendor indicated that the NGO’s staffs would wear recognizable uniforms when they come to collect food, and they express thanks to every vendor who donated food. After the donation, the vendors will receive a sticker that shows the donator certification.

Most of the vendors pasted the donation stickers on their wall because they make them feel proud.

The meat vendor believed that it is complicated and costly to deal with deteriorated food. In the past time, they usually froze the unsold meat in refrigerator for a short period, while they could not keep the meat fresh and healthy for a longer time. They believed that donating the food to NGOs is a double – win solution because they could not only save the time and money

Staff in supermarket The seller indicated that there are two kinds of purchase channels of supermarkets in Mainland China, one is purchasing goods from supplier, another is providing a platform for the producer to sell goods.

Most of chain-supermarket are using the second channel (Fig.6).

Fig. 6. Purchasing Channel of Supermarket

14

In the first channel, supermarkets purchase all goods from suppliers, so they are responsible for the unsold goods. The supermarkets usually arrange the sale promotion when the goods are close to expire date, or they will allow the employees to take them away.

4. How do supermarkets usually deal with the surplus of the almost expired food? And how much percent of those food would be wasted finally?

5. What are the reasons behind the dealing methods conducted by supermarkets? Why the supermarkets prefer dealing the surplus perishable food to donating them to people in need?

In the second channel, supermarket as the distributor provides the location for the producer to sell their goods, their only duty is to pay back the total sales to the producer. If the goods are close to the expire date, supermarket staffs will inform the producer to bring those goods back instead of arranging any discount promotion. In another word, they are not responsible for the expired foods.

After the interview, we summarized the following information about supermarket operation: According to the enterprise's position, supermarket enterprises have developed a complete set of systematic management standards for the products they sell. They will consider the products they sell from the following aspects: the suppliers, production date, place of production, raw materials of products, market acceptance and so on. For example, supermarket chains adopt a chain management system, which is under the leadership of the headquarters of the same business name and shares economic benefits together. Under the mode of chain operation, the goods of branch supermarkets will be uniformly purchased, transported and distributed by the headquarters according to their own planned business standards.

The seller explained that he was only a part-time staff, he knew when and how they should deal with the perishable food, rather than the attitude to donation food. Actually, in mainland China, the food donation of the supermarket is uncommon, most the supermarket managers prefer to deal with the expired food in other methods rather than donating food to people in need.

Economy Student To learn more about supermarket operation, we interviewed economy students. And we mainly focused on these questions: 1. How does the supermarket stock? What factors are supermarkets usually concerned about to deter the purchase quantity of goods?

2. Is the purchase quantity of food products (timesensitive) different from the other goods?

3. Is the accuracy of the estimated purchase quantity of food products usually changed much?

15

For supermarkets, the quantity of food commodities stock are specially planned according to the relative market research. Since food quality is directly relative to people's health compared with other goods, food commodities have higher requirements of stocking.

Supermarkets will be more strictly in control of food commodities. Based on the research on the quantity of food purchased through chain supermarkets, the actual quantity is relatively stable with no constant change.

The basic characteristics of supermarket operation and management are low cost, low interest rate and high flow rate. Generally, supermarkets operate daily consumer goods, and the interest rate is determined by the market,in this case, if the supermarket wants to make profits, it needs to reduce operating costs as much as possible and save manpower and financial resources. Therefore, supermarkets are more inclined to reduce the labor cost as much as possible when dealing with the problem of expired food. As a result, reasonable discount strategy and direct throwing away are common choices for supermarkets to deal with expired food products.

Most supermarkets take action to reduce waste, while they concentrate more on production/procurement period rather than the dispose stage of perishable food. There are several reasons to explain this phenomenon: 1. Business model: whole-life of perishable food consists of several stages -production, distribution, transportation, storage, purchase, etc. Managers have to think about strategies to face food waste from a global perspective. Therefore, considering the expense of each period and the support of big data collected from each chain market, they reasonably choose to deal with food waste from the source of the food to control the production.

Economist Through the interview with the supermarket staff, our team found that sellers in the supermarkets just could not provide us with all the information we were asking for: they just knew when and how they should deal with the perishable food every day, rather than the attitude to NGOs and the evaluation of donation.

So we turned to contract higher-level manager of supermarkets through email. However, managers connected by us through email just didn’t reply to us, let alone answering our questions. Therefore, we take economists as the proxy and ask questions through phone call interview. Generally, social responsibility has always been the common sense among supermarkets. Effective corporate governance, responsible procurement, consumer rights and interests, environment protection are the main parts that managers concern about. Reasonably, reducing food waste should be incorporated into the company's social responsibility.

2. Social responsibility: although donation of the perishable food seems like a win-win strategy for both the supermarkets and society, a hidden trouble exists behind the donation. There is no guarantee for perishable food donated to be 100% safe. If accident happens, the reputation of supermarkets will be destructed severely along with huge amount of compensation.

3 . Co r p o r ate i mage: If supermarkets donate perishable food easily without macroscopic view, selling strategies will be questioned by consumers and corporate image will be affected. Consumers may prefer negative purchase, looking forward to the disposal of products, which will in turn harm the development of supermarkets themselves.

In a nutshell, managers of supermarkets have to consider more about how to deal with perishable food.

16

Business view

Compared with donation, they have more mature choices to protect profits and the healthy development of markets. Concentrating mainly on the upstream process, most of them don’t have the sense and driving force to know about donations by their own effort. In this situation, throw-away becomes the most common method to deal with perishable food. It is not easy to change the present situation because of the standard practice in this field and the fear of too much aspects.

Fundamentally, it is the scale of the organization that affect the decisions made. With the basic intention to make a profit, both supermarket managers and street market sellers have to think and decide at a level above all the procedures associated. For street market sellers, they restock every day before selling and have to deal with all the food remained at the end of the day. The amount of sales depends on various situations every day and the method to reduce losses mainly concentrates on the dispose period. If they deal with the waste by themselves, it would be an extra cost. Therefore, they are glad to donate the food to reduce the cost. As for supermarkets, whose business model consists of periods including distribution, transportation, storage, purchase, managers would reduce the cost by multiple methods. Considering the expense of each period and the support of big data collected, managers reasonably choose to deal with food waste at the upstream. In this way, supermarkets are not so interested in donation as street markers.

Finding Through the interview and volunteer experience with NGOs concerning about food donation, we got to know different situations NGOs are facing toward supermarkets as well as street markets. From the perspective of them, supermarkets and street markets are both target donors while they react differently.

Street market sellers are more friendly through communication and more likely to donate their food remained. As for supermarkets, decision for donation should be permitted by the management and then operated by sellers. The percentage of food donated in everyday leftover also varies obviously: street sellers prefer to dispose as most of the leftover while supermarkets donate less percent.

Trade patterns Both sides perform differently in the selling period.

Generally, consumers pick up goods and pay at the counter in supermarkets, while one could communicate more directly with sellers in street markets. Considering the difference between them, street market sellers tend to act more friendly to outsiders, including interviewers like us and volunteers for donation. In contrary, sellers in supermarket just act as instructed following the guidelines decided by managers. They don’t have enough power to make decisions and obtain commercial information.

By comparison both sides and interviews of related organizations, our group found out several aspects that result in the different attitude of supermarkets and street markets. We would like to manage the descriptions of reasons as follows through comparison.

17

Therefore, there seems to be distance between NGOs and supermarkets, resulting in the seemingly "unfriendly" attitude to donation.

effect. In this project, we concentrate on the different attitude towards donation of surplus perishable food from supermarkets and street markets. It is the large amount of food waste and more concentration from the public that attracted us to observe the difference of attitude towards donation between various food sellers. We assume that it is the business scale that affect the openness to donation, however the fact behind the situations and reasons are more complicated. Our findings during research just partially agree with our hypothesis above.

Social responsibilities It is interesting that, through interviews, supermarkets show more concern about social responsibilities.

"Social responsibility" has become a slogan to advertise supermarkets themselves: it is the sense of responsibility that gives rise to the donation (although less percentage) for they would have taken more convincing and familiar methods to prevent food waste. On the other hand, attitude of street market sellers to donation is simpler than we have assumed.

For them, to reduce losses is the fundamental aim of donation, accompanied by charity as a bonus. This is the most unexpected point throughout our research.

As we have experienced, street market sellers are easier to get close to and willing to share their perspectives to us. Resulting from the mode of selling, street markets are more open to donation, and the basic reason of the openness lies in profits rather than charity. On the other side, supermarkets obviously possess larger scale and more complicated commercial structure, which led us to try to explain the seemingly unfriendly attitude. Besides the fact of different scale and business structure, supermarkets concentrate more on the upstream period of food consumption at a global view. They have formed effective and convincing methods to deal with the balance between profits and social responsibilities.

In this way, although supermarkets have the potential to contribute more to the society, they are not willing to break the self-consistent cycle by their own effort.

This is a reasonable choice for them considering the hidden trouble and extra expense. In this way, it’s time for NGOs to provide promotion for supermarkets to achieve the win-win situation.

Potential risk This is another side effect of the scale: supermarkets generally have larger scale of organization, including more complicated structure and more attention gathered from the public, which will in turn be more seriously affected if food-safety accidents happen.

On the other hand, street markets have more flat structure, in which disputes would be solved more efficiently and sellers could avoid the enlargement of negative effects.

Conclusion This 3-months research project has been a challenging and rewarding task for our group, during which we learn research methods and put them into

As for the limitation of this project, we tried to discover

18

https://www.epd.gov.hk/epd/english/environmentinhk/waste/ prob_solutions/food_waste_challenge.html 6. Goldenberg Suzanne. (2016). From field to fork: the six stages of wasting food. Retrieved from The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jul/14/fromfield-to-fork-the-six-stages-of-wasting-food 7. Hamburg Steve. (2018). Methane: The other important

more beyond previous researches, but were limited by the time and scale of research we could afford. It would be more detailed if more interviews were taken and the results above could be a beginning. What’s more, the lack of Cantonese speaker also obstacle the communication during the research.

greenhouse gas. Retrieved from Environmental Defense Fund: https://www.edf.org/climate/methane-other-importantgreenhouse-gas 8. Horton, H. (2018). Look inside the UK's first 'food waste' supermarket. [online] The Telegraph. Available at: https:// www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/21/look-inside-the-uksfirst-food-waste-supermarket/ [Accessed 28 Nov. 2018].

9. Oxfam.org.hk. (2018). [online] Available at: http://www. oxfam.org.hk/content/98/content_18215en.pdf [Accessed 28 Nov. 2018].

10.World Health Organization. (2018). Global hunger continues to rise, new UN report says. Retrieved from World Health Organization: http://www.who.int/news-room/detail/11-092018-global-hunger-continues-to-rise---new-un-report-says World Wildlife Fund. (2018). Food Waste. Retrieved from 11. World Wildlife Fund: https://www.worldwildlife.org/initiatives/ food-waste

It is a positive current situation that more people realize the importance of reducing food waste and contribute more to the society. Actions of NGOs, as an external force, will activate the potential of donation.

We are convinced that more chances are hidden behind each process of food consumption.

References 1. AngelFood. (2017). Important Figures. Retrieved from Food Angel: https://www.foodangel.org.hk/figure.php 2. ChanWendell. (2016). Why aren’t we encouraging food donations in Hong Kong when our landfills are full of edible waste? Retrieved from South China Morning Post: https:// www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/article/2007803/ why-arent-we-encouraging-food-donations-hong-kongwhen-our 3. Chrisafis, A. (2018). French law forbids food waste by supermarkets. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://

Appendix Volunteer and Interview in Food Angel

www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/04/french-lawforbids-food-waste-by-supermarkets [Accessed 28 Nov. 2018].

4. Cassara, G. (2018). [online] Scholarworks.uvm. edu. Available at: https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/cgi/ viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&https redir=1&article=1238&context=hcoltheses [Accessed 28 Nov. 2018].

5. Environmental Protection Department of Hong Kong. ( 2 0 1 8 ) . F o o d Wa s t e C h a l l e n g e . R e t r i e v e d f r o m Environmental Protection Department of Hong Kong:

19

Interview in Wet Market

20

Interview in Yukejia Supermarket

Below are the questions we try to figure out: Does Food Angel find any difficulty in collaboration with supermarkets? What kinds of food do supermarkets donate? How is the amount?

In your experience, what will supermarkets consider when they are asked to donate food?

Does Food Angel find any difficulty in collaboration with traditional markets? What kinds of food do traditional markets donate? How is the amount?

How does Food Angel find people in need and send food to them?

Thank you so much to read the mail. Hoping we can keep in contact. If you want to call me, my phone number is 54288594. Wish you a wonderful day.

Email To Food Angel

Best regards, Dillon

Email Reply From Food Angel Transcript Dear partners in Food Angel, My name is Chou Ting-Yang. You can call me Dillon.

I am the post graduate student of PolyU, studying in Interaction Design. My team is studying the circumstances of food waste in Hong Kong. We have read the media report about the accomplishments of Food Angel and are impressed on what and how you did. Can we ask you some questions about the operation of the Food Angel and, if possible, join the voluntary jobs? Hope we can keep contact. Thank you.

Transcript Dear Mr. Chou, Thanks for your invitation, we apologize that we cannot help you due to our limited resources. We suggest that you can consider joining our voluntary jobs in either food sharing station or preparation center. You will understand more about our works by participating in it. Please refer to our website to find details. Thank you.

21

Please refer to the website of Food Angel: http://www. foodangel.org.hk/index.php?l=tc or our annual report: http://www.foodangel.org.hk/zh/publication.php Hope everything goes well for you.

Best regards, Food Angel.

22