The newly formed UCD Library Green Group wanted to foster cross campus collaboration as they believed this would assist in realising their green goals. They saw the Learning Enhancement Project as a direct route to the student cohort who, motivated by their passion for the planet, would be willing to help the Library with this task.
Initiative
Waste not, Want not: Transforming Culinary Innovation & Food Product Development
About this initiative
The traditional approach within academia to student driven product development often emphasises individual effort, where students work in silos to develop a product meeting a specific brief. However educational best practice recognises the importance of collaboration and sustainability. With this in mind; the students will be provided with a food product development brief with a sustainable and healthy focus which asks them to individually develop a product and then as a new approach; transition into teams to create a second product with zero food waste due to valorisation of all food surplus generated in the initial development process. The project will have a strong focus on human health and diet, making sustainable and nutritious products and paying close attention to portion control, storage and food waste and loss.
Outcomes
This change in approach will embed Circularity within the Food Product Development process which can contribute to food waste reduction while also promoting resourcefulness and ingenuity.
The food industry calls for graduates that can work with individual creative initiative but can also work collaboratively to address complex sustainability challenges. This project will help to cultivate individual problem-solving skills and then to foster teamwork, resourcefulness, and a culture of sustainability within the student population. This will provide graduates who are unique in their position as future advocators and actors for food sustainability and transformation of the food product development process.