Pere Fullana i Palmer participated in the round table conference on the circular economy of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. Fullana i Palmer is a UN observer at the climate summit in Madrid, in addition to being the director of the UNESCO Chair of Life Cycle and Climate Change at the College of International Trade. The meeting mainly focused on the concrete promotion of examples to combat food waste. These examples are presented while keeping the objectives of the Paris Agreement in mind. The aim is to promote the circular economy throughout the entire value chain.
The agreement also included the objective and ambition to reduce global warming by 1.5 ° C. This was the result of the realization of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
A number of important arguments emerged from the WBCSD: “One third of all food produced for human consumption is lost, equivalent to a loss of $ 1bn and unnecessary emissions of more than 4.4 Gt of CO2 per year. In fact, if food waste were a country, it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the United States.”
Packaging
A number of problems in the supply chain are the main reason for this threat to the environment. The packaging phase is one of the most difficult bottlenecks. However, packaging protects food during transport and is convenient for the consumer. In addition, it extends the expiration dates of some products.
However, there must be a change in the packaging of products, because it causes food waste and extra plastic waste. Businesses and governments are encouraged to find a balance together and to effectively reduce packaging materials by using more efficient packaging.
Pere Fullana claims that he strongly supports smarter use of plastics. In addition, we need to pay careful attention to its waste processing. There are many problems associated with plastic processing today, mainly pollution. However, plastic also offers many advantages such as energy savings and less packaging weight, and must therefore be used in a smarter and more careful way.
Source text: AGF.nl
Source image: Pexels