Fruit & Vegetable Magazine

News Business
GOC funds Outcast Foods in upcycling food waste

February 22, 2022  By Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada


On Feb. 17, Marie-Claude Bibeau, minister of agriculture and agri-food, announced up to $1,545,000 in funding for Outcast Foods Inc. to expand their operations in food waste reduction that upcycles surplus and unsaleable fruits and vegetables from growers, processors and retailers into dried, plant-based powders and solid food ingredients.

More than half of Canada’s food supply is wasted annually and nearly $50 billion of that wasted food is avoidable. By encouraging more solutions to food waste in Canadian society, we can increase food availability, save consumers and businesses money and strengthen our food systems, while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The funding will help support the expansion of their demonstration plant in Dartmouth, N.S., and commission a new full-scale facility in Burlington, Ont. Together the two plants are projected to process up to 35.8 million tonnes of waste fruit and vegetables by 2024 into more than “4,100,000 million pounds” [sic] of plant-based, powdered ingredients annually, a conversion rate of approximately 12 percent. The plant-based ingredients created at these facilities are sold as branded health products as well as raw food and beverage ingredients that are high in nutrition, vitamins, phytochemicals and natural flavours.

Advertisement

Print this page

Advertisement

Stories continue below