South Africa’s food-waste challenge extends well beyond the household bin, with significant volumes of edible food losing value across production, processing, storage and distribution.
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Refreshi says stronger secondary markets could help businesses recover value while keeping suitable surplus in circulation.
Food waste is often framed as a consumer problem, but much of South Africa’s edible food loss happens before products reach the household.
From overproduction and changing demand to cancelled orders, packaging changes and stock with a shorter remaining shelf life, food and consumer goods can become commercially difficult to sell through their original channels while remaining suitable for consumption.
With the United Nations International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste on 29 September, Refreshi is calling for greater attention to these earlier stages of the food supply chain, arguing that consumer food rescue and structured business-to-business trading can play complementary roles in building a more circular food economy.
The scale of the supply-chain challenge
According to the CSIR’s national estimate, approximately 10.3 million tonnes of edible food in South Africa does not reach the human stomach each year, equivalent to about 34% of all food produced in the country.
The study found that the largest share of losses and waste occurs before the consumer stage, with post-harvest handling, storage, processing and packaging accounting for about two-thirds of the total.
Richard Honeyman, co-founder and chief commercial officer of Refreshi Exchange. Image supplied
“The size of the problem shows why business action matters,” says Richard Honeyman, co-founder and chief commercial officer of Refreshi Exchange.
For food manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers, the challenge is therefore not simply to encourage consumers to waste less, but also to improve what happens to surplus stock throughout the commercial food system.
From consumer rescue to B2B surplus
Refreshi already operates at the consumer end of the market through its Surprise Bags, connecting customers with discounted surplus meals and groceries from participating food outlets and retailers.
The model gives consumers access to products at an average saving of 53% against their original retail value, while giving businesses an opportunity to recover some value from food that might otherwise remain unsold.
But Honeyman argues that a similar principle can be applied much earlier in the supply chain.
“If we really want to develop a more circular and sustainable food economy, we need to understand that the same marketplace dynamics are also required far earlier in the system, and may involve pallets of stock rather than individual bags at the grocery store,” he says.
This is the role of Refreshi Exchange, a business-to-business marketplace designed to connect commercial sellers with potential buyers for suitable surplus and discontinued food and consumer-goods stock.
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Creating a secondary route to market
Surplus does not necessarily mean a product is unwanted or unusable.
For businesses, stock can become surplus because forecasts change, retailers alter product ranges, seasonal demand shifts, orders are cancelled or packaging is updated. Products may still have commercial value, but no longer fit the original route to market.
“South Africa’s food-waste discussion can sometimes make surplus sound like a failure of intent,” says Honeyman.
“In reality, businesses manage complex supply chains. Forecasts change, retailers alter ranges and stock can end up in the wrong location at the wrong time. The challenge is to identify what is still suitable, then create a credible route to a buyer who can use it.”
Refreshi Exchange allows sellers to provide information about available stock, while business buyers can assess opportunities based on factors including category, quantity, condition, location and remaining shelf life.
The model puts visibility and speed at the centre of surplus trading, while food safety, product condition, buyer suitability and brand protection remain considerations in responsible transactions.
An additional route, not a replacement for donation
A secondary commercial market does not eliminate the role of food donation or consumer food rescue.
Where surplus is appropriate for charitable redistribution and can be safely and quickly received, donation remains an important part of the food-waste response.
Similarly, consumer food rescue addresses a different point in the value chain.
The argument from Refreshi is that these mechanisms can operate alongside one another, providing businesses with more options depending on the type, volume, condition and timing of their surplus.
“A pallet in one warehouse can be a problem for one business and an opportunity for another,” says Honeyman.
“What is often missing is not demand but visibility, trust and speed.”
Making waste reduction an economic issue
The circular-economy argument also has a commercial dimension.
For sellers, a structured secondary channel can provide an opportunity to recover value from inventory that no longer fits its primary route to market. For buyers, it can provide access to legitimate stock at an alternative purchasing point.
The model also shifts the conversation from simply asking how businesses can dispose of surplus responsibly to asking whether suitable surplus can remain economically useful.
“The goal is not to turn every surplus item into a sale,” says Honeyman.
“It is to give stock that is suitable and safe a better chance of finding the right route to market before it becomes waste.”
For South Africa's food sector, that means food-loss reduction increasingly becomes a supply-chain and commercial efficiency issue as much as an environmental one.
As the country looks to build a more circular food economy, the next opportunity may be less about finding new food and more about creating better systems for moving existing food to where it can still create value.
