The Future of Food: Environmental Lessons from E-Commerce.

Our food system is experiencing dramatic changes as the expansion of e-commerce, introduction of new products, and innovations in supply chain structures all pose to transform how we buy, sell, and distribute food. However, the environmental impacts of these transformations remain unclear. This feature reviews existing literature on environmental implications of e-commerce, discusses relevant trade-offs, and identifies pressing gaps in research. Some trade-offs discussed are those between centralized and decentralized delivery service types, those unique to a rural landscape, and those within the interplay of transportation and consumer behavior. The impacts of fulfillment centers, of refrigerated logistics, of e-commerce on consumer shopping and food waste habits, and of e-commerce services in rural regions are identified as pressing knowledge gaps.

A systems approach to assessing environmental and economic effects of food loss and waste interventions in the United States.

Reducing food loss and waste (FLW) is critical for achieving healthy diets from sustainable food systems. Within the United States, 30% to 50% of food produced is lost or wasted. These losses occur throughout multiple stages of the food supply chain from production to consumption. Reducing FLW prevents the waste of land, water, energy, and other resources embedded in food and is therefore essential to improving the sustainability of food systems. Despite the increasing number of studies identifying FLW reduction as a societal imperative, we lack the information needed to assess fully the effectiveness of interventions along the supply chain. In this paper, we synthesize the available literature, data, and methods for estimating the volume of FLW and assessing the full environmental and economic effects of interventions to prevent or reduce FLW in the United States. We describe potential FLW interventions in detail, including policy changes, technological solutions, and changes in practices and behaviors at all stages of the food system from farms to consumers and approaches to conducting economic analyses of the effects of interventions. In summary, this paper comprehensively reviews available information on the causes and consequences of FLW in the United States and lays the groundwork for prioritizing FLW interventions to benefit the environment and stakeholders in the food system.