Food Loss and Waste country profile Colombia

In Colombia, milk and bovine meat are labelled as extremely critical hotspots, followed by rice and poultry.

Urgency and call for action on Food Loss and Waste (FLW) reduction

Globally, each year possibly as much as 30% of the food produced is being lost or wasted somewhere between farm and fork. Food Loss and Waste (FLW) accounts for around 8 to 10% of our global Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHGEs). Approximately a 25% of all freshwater used by agriculture is associated to the lost and wasted food. 4.4 million km² of land is used to grow food which is lost or wasted. The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 12.3 calls to ‘halve per capita global Food Waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce Food Losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses’. With only 6 years to go, the world is far from being on track to achieve this target.

Read the full Columbia FLW country profile

Figure 1: Top 15 hotspot categories of food loss and waste in terms of volumes and FLW-associated GHG emissions (in CO2-eq.)

Figure 2: Top 15 hotspot categories of the land-use footprints of FLW (in ha)

FLW, GHGEs, nutrition, land use and water footprint country profile Colombia

Based on the country data modelling, estimates on FLW-associated GHGEs were retrieved for Colombia and plotted with the FLW total tonnage to visualize the two components (Figure 1). For FLW the five main hotspots products are: fruits (others), bananas, milk, palm kernels, and plantains. However, ranking food categories according to the production of FLW-associated GHGEs the five hotspot food products for Colombia are: bovine meat, milk, rice, poultry meat, and palm kernels. From the bovine meat chains, 0.13 million tons of FLW represents 4.7 million tons CO2-eq. of GHGEs. For milk, 3 million tons CO2-eq. GHGEs are generated from 1.2 million tons FLW. For rice 0.77 million FLW tons are generated, inducing 2 million tons CO2-eq. GHGEs.

Figure 2 presents the top 15 items with the largest land-use footprints of FLW. Animal-based products are dominating with bovine meat, milk, and poultry meat, ranking the top 3. Fruits, plantains and rice are the most land-use intensive plant-based individual items, ranking 4th and 5th and 6th.

With respect to the water footprints of the FLW, it is not dominated by either animal or plant-based items but demonstrate a mixed situation. Milk and plantains are the top 2 individual-item contributors followed by rice, bovine meat and poultry meat (Figure 3).

From another perspective, taking the percentages of FLW in relation to production percentages, vegetables and fruits are identified as the main hotspots showing average FLW 55% along the chains (Figure 4).

Figure 3: Top 15 hotspot categories of the water footprints of FLW (in m3)

Figure 4: Percentages of FLW per product category

Further insights in hotspots are derived from estimated distribution of the FLW along supply chains in the number one hotspot product in the region (Figure 5). These data suggest that the agricultural production, processing & packaging, and postharvest handling & storage stages of
the fruit and vegetable products are bottlenecks. These are focus points for more detailed data collection and analysis of causes to address potential interventions. Smart interventions in such ‘hotspots’ in food supply chains can substantially contribute to GHG emission mitigation of food systems.

Analysis of specificities of such chains (e.g. comparing informal and formal supply chains, and urban and rural settings) including comparison with supply chains for similar product categories may reveal promising interventions. Interventions may combine hardware (packaging, cooling, etc.), orgware (e.g. arrangements in chains) and software (knowledge, information) elements.

Figure 5: Percentages of FLW per stage in the supply chain for the number one hotspot product category. Remark: Agricultural production does not include any potential yield gaps and focuses on actual production and harvest losses

Figure 6: Top 15 hotspot categories of loss of proteins associated with FLW

Figure 7: Average provision of nutrients per capita relative to WHO dietary recommendations

Figure 6 shows the protein losses associated with FLW where poultry meat, rice, milk, and bovine meat present again on the list of top 5 items. Finally, the food supply and FLW data were used to assess nutrient supply per capita in the Colombian population in relation to recommended nutrient intake (Figure 7). These are average numbers, and it is not likely that nutrients are evenly distributed across Columbia. Hence, there will be parts of the populations that suffer insufficiencies of calcium, folate, iron, vitamin A, and zinc. From nutrition security perspective, efforts for mitigating FLW in milk and rice chains would contribute the most to population nutrient gains (Table 1).

Table 1: Food product categories for which the FLW have highest share for the most critical nutrients

Overall conclusions and suggestions for the next steps

Figure 8 displays a comprehensive ranking of hotspot food products based on five criteria. While there are nine hotspot food products identified, a closer examination reveals notable variations in the ranking of the nine hotspot products across different categories. Milk emerges as an extremely critical product, serving as a hotspot for all five categories. Bovine meat falls into the same category, positioned as a hotspot for four categories and represents the top hotspot product for GHGEs and land use footprints. In the next tier of hotspot products, rice and poultry meat both stand out among the top five hotspots for four categories and are classified as very critical hotspot products. Plantain is identified as a hotspot for three product categories and is classified as a critical product. Meanwhile, palm kernel holds the hotspot designation for two categories and is classified as moderately critical. Banana, despite being the most critical product in terms of FLW in tons, does not rank among the top five products in any of the other four categories and falls into the category of slightly critical products. Similarly, wheat and potatoes each hold a rank in only one hotspot category, both falling into the same category of slightly critical products, with wheat showing significant FLW-associated protein losses and potatoes for FLW tons.

It is suggested to develop FLW reduction actions, with synergy on GHGEs mitigation, nutrition, land-use and water footprints. The above analysis underlines that, if one considers sustainability in the context of these five selected indicators, the greatest impact can be achieved by concentrating efforts on milk, bovine meat, rice, and poultry compared to focusing on other food products.

Since the results are not on product level, it is not immediately clear, where to start your intervention. Our suggestion to develop FLW reduction actions, with synergy on GHGEs mitigation, nutrition, land-use and water footprints, is to implement monitoring or/and gather primary data for hotspot-supply chains of the country. The results in this document guide stakeholders by focusing on the top four food (sub)categories in combination with the indicative results on FLW per supply chain link. To research interventions, it is necessary to go to product level, which can be based on production or trade data in the country. The next step is to identify business cases for FLW reduction. For this purpose, WUR’s EFFICIENT protocol and FLW cause and intervention tool can be used.

Figure 8: Ranking of hotspot product across five criteria