Working to minimise food waste is one of our commitments in the sustainability goal Protecting Nature. Since the start of the sustainability programme, our bakery products line holds the ambition to reduce the waste, as recorded in 2017, with 50% by 2025. Also our margarine factories are determined to tackle food waste. Today, you will learn more on where are we today.
During the Covid period, we produced less and planned longer runs, due to absence of people. The demand dropped and stocks were kept as low as possible. We produced mainly with our own experienced staff, which unfortunately caused a loss of experienced temporary people.
After Covid, we had difficulties to follow the ramp up of sales and restore stock levels. As we want to satisfy the customers as much we could, we had many changeovers and shorter runs, sometimes less than 4 hours per product. In production, it’s a known fact that each changeover and start-up generates extra losses, which is amplified by working with less experienced temporary workers. On top of that, we faced some unexpected situations and incidents that also meant a raise in these figures. For example:
- There was a shortage of good quality butter on the market. Due to lower quality butter, we had more risk to take, resulting in productions non-conform to the quality standards.
- The impact of Covid 19 as well as the war in Ukraine.
Some examples that helps us to reduce food waste:
Short Interval Controls (SIC) introduced by our on-site Make & Bake operational excellence programme.
On a daily basis, the losses or waste, in terms of kilograms and cost, are discussed. This helps awareness and setting up actions to prevent and do better in the future.
Prioritising explaining unexplained losses and organising actions.
e.g., adapting recipe, water dosage,…
Extensive research on optimised ways to recuperate finished goods.
For example: we are grinding excess bread and add these breadcrumbs to the fresh bread dough, still receiving the same high-quality end product.
