Anmar Frangoul | Special to CNBC.com
As the global population increases, the issue of food waste is becoming increasingly pressing.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, 30 to 40 percent of the world’s food production does not even make it to market, with roughly 1.3 billion tons of food – valued at more than $1 trillion – either wasted or lost.
In some parts of the world, the consequences of such wastage can be stark. A 2014 report from the Institute of Mechanical Engineers states a lack of proper storage results in the loss of “up to 50 percent of fruit and vegetables” in Sub-Saharan Africa and India, while 25 percent of milk produced during Tanzania’s wet season is also wasted.
An MIT start-up has developed technology that is dramatically improving the way milk can be stored in Indian communities where access to electricity is difficult and reliable refrigeration is limited.
“Most Indian villages have grid power, they have electricity,” Sorin Grama, co-founder and CTO of Promethean Power Systems, told CNBC in a phone interview. “They’re not completely off grid, they just don’t have power 24 hours a day, they don’t have it when they need it,” he added.