CORAL GABLES, FL - Tackling the food waste challenge is a collaborative effort. Turning to its employees for inspiration, Fresh Del Monte Produce (FDM) recently partnered with TripleWin Advisory to launch a comprehensive food waste engagement program at its manufacturing plant in Portland, Oregon. The primary goal of this initiative was to identify and implement effective, data-driven strategies for reducing food waste, with an emphasis on creating solutions that are measurable, scalable, and replicable across the company’s global operations. Three employee ideas signaling the same food waste reduction opportunity for the Fresh Del Monte plant were selected, offering a new approach to food waste reduction, waste management, and increased efficiency.
“We aim to make a significant impact on food waste reduction while fostering a culture of sustainability within our workforce and across our broader operations,” said Ana Cueva, Manager, Sustainability Global Program, Fresh Del Monte Produce. “The three chosen ideas focused specifically on improving product handling to reduce food waste. By receiving fruit in a cleaner environment during inspection, the Portland plant has minimized waste and increased the number of products converted into finished goods for customer orders. This change also allows more unused products to be sent to the animal farm as feed, reducing overall waste. Additionally, these adjustments lowered monthly operational costs.”
Fresh Del Monte is a signatory of the Pacific Coast Food Waste Commitment (PCFWC) and the U.S. Food Waste Pact. As part of this, the producer actively engages in various initiatives to reduce food loss and waste, while exploring diversion and circular upcycling opportunities within its plant operations. FDM’s Food Waste Working Group holds multiple meetings a year to set objectives, targets, and action plans. Groups like this one—of which Fresh Del Monte has six total—play a vital role in driving the strategy and implementation of the supplier’s sustainability initiatives.
FDM also drew inspiration from similar employee engagement projects from companies like Bob’s Red Mill and Land O’ Lakes, which were initiated by the PCFWC to accelerate food waste reduction in the Pacific Coast region.
“More than 15 percent of the food waste reduction ideas submitted during the month-long employee engagement challenge focused on ways to upcycle byproducts that would otherwise become food waste,” Cueva recalled. “These ideas offer a great opportunity to turn potential waste into new products or sell byproducts to other markets. The food loss and waste pilot project showed that food upcycling can be both practical and profitable. Some ideas included using small or slightly damaged fruits and vegetables to make products like fruit juices, popsicles, smoothies, salad or coleslaw toppings, freeze-dried snacks, wine, soda, jam, and baby food.”
As reflected by this unique program, FDM is deeply committed to managing food loss and waste across its entire value chain. The company has set ambitious waste and climate goals aligned with UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2, 12, and 13.
To advance these goals, FDM engaged employees across all levels of operations at its Portland, Oregon, facility. This initiative gave frontline workers—those most familiar with where food waste occurs in daily production cycles—a chance to contribute their insights and ideas for waste reduction. FDM recognized that involving these "in-the-know" employees would lead to meaningful ideas that could drive impactful waste reduction initiatives. This effort, designed as a pilot program, paved the way for a more expansive rollout across the supplier’s other U.S. operations.
“We plan to continue sourcing ideas from employees. It’s been a great way to get new ideas and involve employees. We’ll keep it going and look for even more ways to make it work better in the future,” Cueva concluded. “Going forward, we will strategically look at ways to replicate these efforts at other facilities and in other regions, using the best practices and learnings we gained from this project.”
Cheers to Fresh Del Monte Produce on its ambitious commitment to mitigating food waste. For more updates on the strategies implemented to achieve these goals, be sure to leave a tab open to ANUK.
