Food saved from waste

Every day, 6,000 tons of perfectly good food in Romania goes to waste. 60% of this quantity comes from the industry. Producers, distributors, retailers—everyone involved in the supply and processing chain.

However, there are solutions to prevent this waste. And the most efficient and impactful one is food donation.

Macromex, a company that has been active for 30 years as a distributor in the frozen and refrigerated food industry, started donating food four years ago. In this time, it has saved 3,000 meals from destruction. These are products that are good for consumption but are approaching their expiration date, which is why stores no longer accept them. Therefore, they cannot be sold.

Roxana Maxim, a manager within the company, explains how the products to be donated are chosen: "Because we live in the era of digitalization, the system helps us identify short-dated products and track them in real-time. There is a report that proposes short-dated products, a proposal accessed by our colleagues in charge of donations, who decide which products and to which beneficiary they should go, and then we, the warehouse, prepare and deliver them to partners." One of the partners is Banca pentru Alimente (Food Bank), an association that takes food, stores it in its own warehouse, and from there, distributes it to another 165 partner NGOs. These NGOs, in turn, deliver the packages to their own beneficiaries—children, the elderly, vulnerable people—for whom food is often a challenge.

Since its establishment in 2017, the Food Bank has saved 18,000 tons of food and fed over 200,000 needy people.

"Any product donation is a gain for the company"

Beyond helping people in need, food donation is also an opportunity for companies in the industry to avoid product destruction costs.

"When you throw something away, you've acquired a product, you've paid for it, and you pay another fee for its destruction. The more expensive or select the product, the higher those fees. Because it's one thing to throw away bread and another to throw away meat. So any product donation is a gain for the company. Because the moment you donate, you get rid of any fees you had for destruction. If you have donated products and can do it as a sponsorship, you deduct their entire value through the sponsorship contract. If you donate them under the food waste law, you deduct the VAT from the start because you have no longer carried out a commercial activity. You can count the value of the products as an expense in the company's budget and gain some advantages," said Gabriel Sescu, president of the Food Bank.

Although there is still much to be resolved legislatively to stop food waste, even with current laws, there are already three ways for companies to donate food:

1. Through product sponsorship for companies that pay corporate tax. The value of the products must not exceed 20% of the tax.
2. Through donation based on the food waste law, for products expiring within a few days.
3. Through simple donation, for products not exceeding 5,000 euros. This is the easiest option, with the least bureaucracy.

A film showing how this donation system works and how food can be recovered at 12:00 on a given day and arrive as dinner for poor children by 19:00 that evening can be seen in episode 8 of the campaign "A Second Life. Circular Economy Models."

The campaign is initiated by the Sustainable Solutions Association, with the support of Stratos and Eco Synergy, with the aim of inspiring the business environment to transition from a linear to a circular business model as quickly and easily as possible.

Here you can watch episode 1, about Waste: From waste to raw material through innovation

Here you can see episode 2, dedicated to Construction: Profit from rubble

Here, episode 3, dedicated to Packaging: Goodbye single-use packaging

Here, episode 4, dedicated to the Textile Industry: Better designed clothes, less thrown away

Here, episode 5, about Sustainable Agriculture: Hemp, a strategic crop

Here, episode 6, about Electrical and Electronic Equipment: New Eco-Design

Here, episode 7, about Wastewater: Gold from the sewers