TRANSFORMING OUR IMPACT
WITH INNOVATION AND TECHNOLOGY
SPECIAL FEATURE: IN PIPELINE CREATING CLEAN
By Katy Bluett, Callaghan Innovation’s food & beverage group manager
Toitū te Marae o Tane-Mahuta,
Toitū te Marae o Tangaroa,
Toitū te tangata - If the land
is well, and the sea is well, the
people will thrive.
As the fabric of New Zealand’s
economy, making up over 50% of
our export earnings, the food and
beverage industry faces powerful
forces of change.
Tech and science provide significant
transformation opportunities
in a sector heavily influenced
by consumer preferences, not
least our impact on the planet.
Consumers are demanding more
transparency, better production
processes, provenance and
nutrition.
Innovation and smart new tools can
help us achieve the changes that
can, and will eventually, be made
right across our food system from
the processing to the packaging,
the transportation to the disposal or
re-purposing of food.
From carbon credits to animal
welfare, technology plays a key
role in quantifying the outstanding
practices we have in New Zealand
thanks to deeply committed food
producers.
The good news is we have a vibrant
community of entrepreneurs and
innovators tackling sustainability
challenges and a food industry
rapidly mobilising to address these
challenges in their businesses.
In terms of provenance, firms like
Trustcodes with its traceability
technology are increasing the
transparency of food, validating
authenticity. While strengthening
New Zealand’s brand overseas, it
is setting an enviable benchmark
for our international competitors.
Dunedin-based Oritain is taking that
a step further working on proving
the origin of food at the molecular
level, and next year Callaghan
Innovation’s new NMR machine will
tell us the honest makeup of liquid
form foods.
The country’s first large-scale,
waste-to-energy plant was
announced by Minister Shane
Jones this year at Turners and
Growers’ Reporoa covered crops
facility. The proposed purposebuilt
facility will take food waste
from the region (and from T&G’s
tomato vines), turn it into renewable
biogas energy, which can then be
used to enhance growth in our
glasshouses and power up the
region, naturally.
In terms of energy use, Auckland
based startup Infuse AI specialise
in optimising cooling systems.
The company aims to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions using
innovative cooling technology
- exploiting the thermodynamic
processes for heat exchange
between a liquid and a heat
source. This clever technology
can be adopted for a wide range
of industrial and commercial
applications.
Earlier this year Aoraki Development
launched a major sustainability
initiative for the South Canterbury
region's food producing sector as
it looks at new ways to cut down
on waste. The "Sustainable is
Attainable" initiative joins more than
20 local organisations, including
DB Breweries, Sanford, Fonterra,
Barkers and Fresh Pork, alongside
science and tech experts, in a bid
to find new ways to sustainably
manage the industry's waste.
Scientists and engineers are also
working closely with industry to
add value to by-products and waste
streams under the Government
funded Bioresource Processing
Alliance initiative.
There’s an innovation explosion in
packaging. The Better Packaging
Katy Bluett
Co. are designing customised ecofriendly
packaging. FoodCap is
using materials science to design
customised reusable and bulk food
storage and tipping containers
for the likes of Baker Boys in
Christchurch. Biome has successfully
turned pest algae didymo into paper,
fabric and bioplastics used in a range
of products including disposable
cutlery.
Global sustainable investments have
risen 34% to US$30.7 trillion and
technology innovators are receiving
an increasing chunk of this to take
their solutions to market. Businesses
in the sector will do well to build
collaborative value-add relationships
with smart local innovators. The new
and expanding Scale-Up NZ platform
is a great place to start scoping out
up and coming Kiwi foodtech players.
24 November 2019