Over the last few years, the scandal of food waste has rightfully moved from the periphery and into the mainstream. From Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's prime-time War on Waste TV show to France’s trail-blazing legislation banning supermarkets from binning unsold food - the chorus of campaigning is louder than ever. The issue has been featured heavily in the news, thrust higher into the political agenda and public imagination.
While the focus recently has been on waste created by supermarkets or in production processes, of the 15 million tons of food thrown away each year in the UK, nearly half is chucked out by us at home. Households in the UK bin more than £12bn of edible food every year, which equates to 22% of their weekly shop, and a cost of £700 per year. Conservative and arbitrary use-by dates, careless buying behaviour and poor portion planning are just some causes of wastage. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
OLIO is a free app that aims to remedy this, by connecting neighbours with each other and with local independent shops to share their surplus food. This could include food nearing its sell-by date, a glut of apples from an allotment, unused cupboard items, or veggies you won’t use in time. Users simply snap a picture of their items and post them on OLIO for their neighbour to collect.
OLIO is now live in Oxford and neighbours across the city are already sharing their surplus food stuffs with each other, while Oxford Organic Deli, Modern Baker, and 2 North Parade Produce are also sharing their excess surplus stock. Dropboxes for the app are located in Refresh Café on Cowley Road, Wild Honey and others.
Check it out here: https://olioex.com/
Thanks to CAG for this great write up of OLIO's launch in Oxford!
