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As the ROSETTA project enters its next phase, several exciting initiatives are underway to drive meaningful change in reducing food waste and fostering sustainability. From workshops and research advancements to the launch of the digital toolkit, these efforts will continue to support collaboration and innovation across Europe’s food systems.

The First Community of Practice Meeting

On 5th February 2025, the ROSETTA project will host its first Community of Practice (CoP) meeting. This event will bring together stakeholders to discuss food loss, explore marketing standards, and share insights that drive sustainability. The meeting aims to highlight the importance of collaboration and knowledge sharing, serving as a platform to strengthen the community’s collective impact.

Workshops: Engaging Stakeholders Across the Supply Chain

The agenda for the upcoming workshops has been finalised, detailing session topics and their duration. These workshops focus on implementing interactive sessions designed to foster collaboration, identify solutions, and share best practices across the food supply chain. The workshops aim to engage key stakeholders—including retailers, transport and logistics providers, processors, and consumers—in meaningful dialogue to address food waste challenges linked to marketing standards.

To ensure accessibility and inclusivity, the agenda will be translated into local languages and distributed to stakeholders in the five MIP countries: Greece, Ireland, Denmark, Spain, and Poland. Participant selection criteria have been carefully defined to ensure balanced representation, enabling diverse perspectives to enrich the discussions.

Looking ahead, a comprehensive workshop protocol is under development. This protocol will provide structured guidance for each session, ensuring consistency and alignment with the project’s objectives. The workshops will serve as platforms for exchanging knowledge, testing innovative solutions, and gathering valuable insights to support ROSETTA’s broader goals.

The Digital Toolkit: A Key Milestone Approaching

A major milestone in the ROSETTA project is the development of the Digital Toolkit, which will provide stakeholders with innovative tools to reduce food waste and enhance collaboration. Scheduled for its initial release in June 2025, the toolkit is designed to support knowledge sharing, best practices, and actionable solutions across Europe’s food systems.

The Digital Toolkit will comprise three main components:

  • A Repository: Centralised assessment reports and data to offer evidence-based insights.
  • A Catalogue: A curated collection of good practices and marketing models.
  • An Open Innovation Platform: A collaborative space for stakeholders to exchange ideas and develop solutions.

The Open Innovation Platform will include two tailored forums: one for the Community of Practice (CoP) and another for the Multi-Actor Innovation Platforms (MIPs). To enhance usability, certain features—such as the MIP-focused forum—will be available in five local languages: English, Danish, Polish, Spanish, and Greek.

By providing these tools and fostering dynamic interaction, the Digital Toolkit will play a pivotal role in advancing ROSETTA’s mission to reduce food waste and promote sustainable practices.

Estimating Food Waste Due to Marketing Standards

A critical focus of the ROSETTA project is understanding the extent to which marketing standards contribute to food waste along the supply chain. This phase of work is dedicated to developing estimation models to quantify this impact. These models will be validated through monitoring pilot experiments and testing solutions within the identified use cases.

Each MIP case will collect data tailored to specific products and their respective supply chain configurations. The primary objective of Task 1.4 is to gather data that validates the preliminary model developed to estimate food waste caused by marketing standards. Specifically, the task aims to:

  • Identify the key drivers of food waste associated with marketing standards at each stage of the supply chain.
  • Explore potential practices—including unobserved practices and systemic insights—to mitigate food waste within specific supply chains.
  • Examine how marketing standards themselves may contribute to reducing food waste within these chains.

The insights gathered will be transformed into detailed flowcharts for each of ROSETTA’s food commodities: fruits and vegetables, dairy, cereals, and meat. These flowcharts will organize  the gathered insights for each food commodity, offering clarity on food waste patterns and possible mitigation approaches.

Both public and private marketing standards will be analysed, considering the unique specifications and particularities of each product within the food supply chain.

By taking this approach, the project will enable the project to estimate food waste under realistic scenarios and provide valuable insights into how solutions developed in the use cases can prevent and reduce waste across supply chains.

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