Share, Optimise, Closed-Loop for Food Waste (SOL4FoodWaste): The Case of Walmart-Mexico

The food waste in landfill decomposes into contaminated run-off (leachate) and methane (CH₄), which is considered a relevant greenhouse gas. This causes environmental liabilities, energy losses and problems in the food system. Currently, organic waste volumes are increasing dramatically converting this into a serious concern in both developed and developing countries. Zero waste to landfill (ZWTL) is one of the most promising concepts for solving organic waste problems. ZWTL when integrated into business processes can lead to innovative ways to identify, prevent and reduce waste. In that sense, the circular economy (CE) has also been considered regularly as an approach to the more appropriate waste management as it considers the business strategy part of the zero waste system. This circularity would increase productivity throughout the food value chain. In that manner, retail stores are proven to be a major market-driven force in the food system. Hence, one retail store located in the Metropolitan Area of Mexico City, part of Walmart-Mexico (Walmex), was selected to showcase a suitable strategy to tackle the food waste issue. Thus, this research aimed to explore how the organic waste management can be improved by combining CE business model and a ZWTL strategy. The findings of the combined framework (SOL4FoodWaste) showed that most of the food considered as waste can be recovered through different stages. Even further, 40% of the food waste management costs can be saved through three business actions associated to those recovery stages. The proposed SOL4FoodWaste framework intends to collect all the sustainable concepts that might potentially be implemented or resembled in other industries with similar food waste challenges.