In what the CSIRO is calling the ‘future of snack food’, Nutri V Goodies snacks will see a reduction in food wastage whilst supporting farmers to become more sustainable.
CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, worked with start-up Nutri V to create healthy vegetable snacks. They contain broccoli, pumpkin and cauliflower that can’t be sold and would’ve ended up in landfill or become animal feed.
Aimed at helping eliminate large-scale food wastage and giving farmers the opportunity to implement sustainable farming practices.
According to CSIRO, on average, 2 to 3 in every 10 vegetable plants that have been planted on-farm are wasted. What is left behind in the field, like leaves and stalks, hasn’t yet been measured nor has the amount of food that’s lost in total.
Nutri V, the start-up working with CSIRO, wants to make sure that 100% of crop yield is utilised, with all non-retail produce being turned into nutritional foods.
It’s important that we try to minimise the impacts farming and excessive food wastage have on the environment. Rather than shaming farming practices and industries, we need initiatives and strategies that work both for farming families and for the environment.
CEO of Nutri V, Raquel Said, explained in a CSIRO press release that the company was born from a farming business that has a passion for sustainability and innovation.
According to Said, farmers are often left with tonnes of vegetables that don’t meet specifications or are in surplus so they aren’t able to be sold. Most of these are stalks and leaves that are still perfectly nutritious.
“We wanted to create a business to upcycle that waste into a sustainable yet delicious solution, which is what we’ve done with the Nutri V vegetable powders, a star ingredient in Nutri V Goodie snacks,” Said elaborated.
The food wastage processing module used by Nutri V is located on the farm of their parent company, Fresh Select. The farm is one of Australia’s largest brassica growers.
Veggies are picked and sorted in the morning before being washed and dried into powders. They are then turned into Nutri V Goodie snacks by the afternoon.
Such systems are what Nutri V hopes other vegetable growers across the nation will use to help them tackle their food wastage.
Not only do these vegetable goodies help minimise food wastage they will also help Aussies stay on top of their veggie intake. Each pack of Nutri V Goodies have two servings of vegetables in them and have a higher health star rating than other snack foods available.
Obviously, CSIRO has launched many initiatives aimed at reducing human impact on the environment and worsening climate change. They’ve previously worked with UTS to create smart bins that know how to recycle as well as using AI to help the Great Barrier Reef.
Speaking on the collaboration CSIRO director of Agriculture and Food Dr Michael Robertson said that vegetable-rich food innovation, like Nutri V, helped farmers add real value to their businesses whilst supporting sustainability in the agrifood sector.
“This partnership with a business at the forefront of agricultural production is a terrific example of how research can work with industry for the benefit of Australia,” Robertson said.
Coles Chief Executive of Commercial and Express, Leah Weckert said the food wastage project “highlights how working with Coles’ suppliers can help us achieve our Together to Zero sustainability ambitions.”
Nutri V Goodie snacks will be hitting Coles supermarkets nationally this month.