SUSTAINABILITY AND ENVIRONMENT BIG INTICEMENT One of the biggest challenges within the food industry is sustainability of food and the environmental impact of the processing, says Central Hawke’s Bay award-winning young food technology student Nicole Harvey (19) …and that’s why food technology is an exciting career to choose. The growth of the world’s population is putting a higher demand on processing chains to increase production rates to match the needs of consumers. This is causing a strain on processing plants to maintain high quality, while also being sustainable and environmentally friendly. New Zealand’s unique advantage and main selling point to import and export markets is the ‘clean green’ image we portray. This clean green image is achieved through the strong horticulture and aquaculture that New Zealand has developed throughout the food industry, that provides nutrient-rich soil for our produce to grow on and our livestock to graze. This in return has enabled fresh products and high quality meat to be delivered to processing plants and onto distributors with limited time and handling, so that the end product for the consumers is almost straight from the paddock to the shelves. Food technologists, within New Zealand, continue to focus on developing processes that prevent the products from perishing, while maintaining the original nutrients by limiting the amount of additives and processes that remove this goodness. This ‘clean green’ reputation results in farm regulations and environment plans frequently being developed and updated to maintain the high quality standard of produce and livestock. However, it is a continuous challenge to be able to manage processing plants to fit within these new regulations and changes. To be able to increase sustainability and improve processing plants throughout New Zealand’s food industry, focus must be placed on the waste streams and the packaging of products. Many production lines encounter waste streams due to unwanted or unused by-product, and there is a major opportunity within the food industry to decrease these waste streams by finding other uses. Not only does it add value to the product and strengthen New Zealand’s food industry, it also continues to promote and vitalise our ‘clean green’ image. I wish to be part of food technology teams that analyse waste streams and develop new and innovating ideas around how to reduce these by-products without large additional costs and whilst maintaining efficiency. I also wish to continue to develop packaging of products so that it is made out of recyclable or reusable material. Within the food industry there has already been increased awareness and development of recyclable packaging, however there is still a large proportion of food products sold to consumers that contribute greatly to 18 SEPTEMBER 2017 waste. Decreasing the amount of non-recyclable packaging sold to consumers would improve sustainability and enable large scale production to keep up with the growing demands of the expanding population, enabling New Zealand’s food industry to be more economical and environmentally friendly. My goal would be to design food products and processes that minimise by-products and increase efficiency, thereby reducing food wastage so that companies become more economically competitive. This would, in turn, strengthen New Zealand’s economy. Food technology purely focuses on taking a product or process and developing the concept in order to improve the standard, quality and efficiency. Each scenario for each product and process is unique, hence the problem or opportunity that is to be resolved is new and requires a high level of evaluating and a wide range of perspectives. FEATURE STORY
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