Koichi Takahashi’s lifelong dream of fostering environmental sustainability has led him to an innovative solution for recycling food waste. Takahashi, driven by a vision of a world where recycling and regeneration coexist harmoniously with nature, has focused on transforming leftover human food into high-quality pig feed through his company, the Japan Food Ecology Center.
Japan, with its limited land and mountainous terrain, faces significant challenges in achieving food self-sufficiency. The country imports nearly two-thirds of its food and three-quarters of its livestock feed, while discarding 28.4 million tonnes of food annually, much of it still edible. This waste incurs substantial environmental and economic costs, including higher food prices due to reliance on imports and significant expenditure on waste incineration, which amounts to 800 billion yen (£4.2 billion/$5.4 billion) annually. Food waste constitutes about 40% of Japan’s incinerated rubbish, contributing to air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.
As the world’s fifth-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, Japan has committed to reducing emissions by 46% by 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. Tackling food waste is a crucial component of these goals, according to Takahashi.
His interest in sustainable food solutions began in 1998, when the Japanese government initiated a project to explore converting wasted resources into livestock feed. Faced with rising import costs and a looming crisis in the livestock industry, Takahashi saw an opportunity to address these challenges through his innovative recycling project.