About this project
FoPo Food Powder - Saving almost expiring fruits DELICIOUSLY
SEK 219,786
160
We also have Rachel Rivera, current Philippine project director, and Clementine Turgeon, Paula Matias and Hans Marin as our key Philippine Ambassadors!
OUR DELICIOUS STORY
We are a group of Lund University international students, together with other course mates studying Masters of Food Innovation and Product Design, who happen to be disturbed by the fact that the number of people who are hungry are increasing despite record highs in world food production.
Upon going deeper into the problem, we found out that we waste 40% of the food we produce throughout the food chain system: from farmers to distributors, to wholesalers, to retailers, and finally to consumers. However, we see food waste as an opportunity to create something more useful to solve world hunger. With a few clicks in the internet, and some visits with relevant contacts working on food waste, we saw that groceries and local farms are throwing a lot of food. Fruits and vegetables which do not look good, or are spoiled, are immediately thrown away.
Armed with knowledge about food technologies, we know that bacteria causes spoilage, and bacteria loves water. By drying the food, we can save it from being expired. Hence, we explored different drying techniques for fruits right before expiry, use pulverizer to make powder, and POOF! We created FoPo food powder - a delicious food powder that extended the shelf life of food from 2 weeks to 2 years, maximize logistics distribution due to its powder form, and still retain the nutritional content of the food!
Our teammates from the Philippines saw a window of opportunity in the country to help people in need, especially during relief operations after calamities strike, and for feeding programs as it can be a supplement to help the food nutrition deficiency of people. With 22 typhoons and series of landslides and earthquakes devastating the country every year, FoPo can be a good addition to the usual relief good packs consisting of unhealthy noodles and canned goods. Performing the business in the Philippines also means providing more jobs to poor communities, something we are also exploring with our talks with the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
We are not introducing a new technology or product. We just created value by simply fixing the inefficiency of the current food system. FoPo is an innovative solution offering profitability, serious scalability potential, immediate and direct impact.
With the groceries, Philippine government, universities and private companies now excited to work on our side, we will not allow another person to go hungry again with FoPo Food Powder, Save Food Deliciously!
OUR SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS MODELFoPo will receive cheap fruits and vegetables that would be otherwise trashed from supermarkets and local markets. These will be processed into powder by our toll manufacturers and sold back to the grocery stores. The customers will use it for example in veggie soups, smoothies, yogurt toppings, and baking. We will also sell directly to food manufacturers and restaurants who use food powder as ingredient in other products such as fruit juice. Online stores will also be set up.
Industry standard costing structure spends 60% of their budget on purchasing fruits and vegetables, but FoPo only needs to pay one fourth of that, allowing us to produce for a lower price.
FOPO IS ALREADY CATCHING FIIIIIIRE!
In just 2 months of pitching to potential partners, FoPo business model is already catching fire. In the Philippines, 26 supermarkets signed the letter of intent to work with us and 10 local market stores we surveyed would donate their expiring fruit and veggies. 3 universities offered their laboratories for shelf-life and nutritional testing for free. The Philippine government is also involved in this cause. They will help in piloting FoPo in a poor community.
We surveyed 140 consumers internationally, and 87% are interested in purchasing FoPo. This shows wide consumer acceptance and immense potential for global expansion. As for scalability, after pitching FoPo in Poland, we immediately received 10 signed expressions of interests from grocery stores and 2 farms. The potential for this business is definitely to go global.
An international food & beverage company has signed the letter of intent to explore FoPo as their supplier. FoPo was also invited to join the UN FAO SAVE FOOD community of practice, which will soon give us access to an even larger network.
We have recently won $5000 from the Thought For Food Challenge last February in Lisbon, Portugal! This international media mileage about our idea has caught the attention of the following press:
Lundagard
Lund University
Food Innovation and Product Design
Rappler (Philippines)Interaksyon
CNN Philippines - to be aired
With more and more people excited to join us, we have also gotten various volunteer inquiries from all over the world! We have established our first volunteer team in the Philippines, which we have already mobilized to make parts of the video possible :)
SERIOUS PLANS IN COMING MONTHSWe have been very busy recently in terms of creating the perfect product that is suitable for human consumption. We read all the fine details of the Food Safety Law and requirements to only provide the best for you. We are also negotiating with possible key partners to be able to produce our first product and sell it to consumers.
NEXT 2 MONTHS1. Launch our kickstarter campaign!2. Finish our microbiological analysis and sensory testing to target consumers3. Complete all business requirement tasks in setting up a business4. Boost our PR campaign to attract more attention and get support from interested people all over the world
IN 2-5 MONTHS1. Perform pilot testing in the Philippines (yes, we will fly to the Philippines this July!) and make sure that we can create food powder from fruits and vegetables taken from groceries and farms, and sell it to final consumers.2. Settle on the toll manufacturer partner in the Philippines for bulk batch processing.3. Officially open our online store and sell FoPo to the whole world4. Establish and mobilize a strong and capable team to keep the business running in the Philippines.
IN 6-12 MONTHS1. We will explore on possible key tie-up with NGOs willing to purchase our product for humanitarian aid missions, etc. and pilot it in a relief operation.2. Expand potential customers to restaurants and companies who are in need of FoPo.3. Explore selling it to groceries as an FMCG product.
IN 1-3 YEARSOnce we have learned and understood the business more, we will then try to expand to more regions in the Philippines, and also expand it to other countries in the near future!
WHERE YOUR HELP WILL BE USED We will use 180,000 SEK (~USD 21,600 or EUR 19,400 or PHP 961,200) to start our initial production, which will be spent in 3 key areas:
126,000 SEK (~USD 15,100 or EUR 13,600 or PHP 673,000) for manufacturing - initial payment for purchase of fruits & vegetables, as well as toll manufacturer payments
36,000 SEK (~USD 4,300 or EUR 3,900 or PHP 192,000) for administrative and operational needs - transportation, food, communication, and other day-to-day expenses to facilitate business transactions
18,000 SEK (~USD 2,200 or EUR 1,900 or PHP 96,200) for marketing - developing website, paying for advertisements during the online selling and attracting more volunteers, and creating rewards for you, our backers!
Your support will transform this amazing idea into reality! This is our opportunity to make a change. By supporting FoPo, you can help us provide an affordable yet high nutritional value food to the poor, ideal for humanitarian aid or feeding programs in the Philippines and other developing countries. You are also helping solve the world hunger not by cutting down trees and producing more food, but by saving 40% of the food we waste.
Help us make the world more sustainable and feed the hungry, through FoPo Food Powder, Saving Food Deliciously!
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REWARDS: ADDITIONAL DETAILS
*Food Heroes Day
Ever dreamed of becoming Superman or Catwoman, but your parents never passed on their powers to you? Well, now is your chance to live your childhood fantasy and represent YOURSELF (WHOA!) as being a Food Hero, this coming World Food Day at a chosen location in Sweden.
Here are some exciting activities we are cooking up for you, our savior!
1. Silent disco - Heroes don’t need loud music to save the night.
2. Meet & greet other backers - Prepare to share your superpowers to other heroes, and learn new techniques (such as how to fit in those tight clothes, for example).
3. Free Ben & Jerry’s ice cream - Because every hero needs a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to recharge after a day’s work.
4. Meet the founders, and lecture about the food industry- Getting inspired by knowledgeable people talk about the food industry, plus meeting the founders, can help heroes to stay heroes even in everyday lives.
Fruits Picture E-Gallery
Become a masterpiece in our “Ugly Fruits” gallery! You will be able to choose a cartoon representation of one of the fruits we saved, name it and we will feature it on a special dedicated page of the FoPo website. The perfect proof you are not only socially and environmentally conscious hero, but also deliciously creative!
*Volunteer in the Philippines
You will get to see the real Philippines, not just the instagram-filtered holiday version. Moreover, you will help to directly improve the lives of local communities while gaining invaluable experience and skills and seeing how much impact you can make.
1. Accommodation and assistance will be provided for the whole duration of your stay . Costs related to the accomplishment of the task for FoPo will be covered / paid for, depending on the agreement.
2. Job description will be dependent on the applicant’s skills and interests. It can be working directly for FoPo, or indirectly through our partner NGOs and farmers.
3. Flight, insurance, food and other personal expenses needed to go to Philippines and back to home country are not included. A waiver form must be signed prior to booking the flights or applying for visa.
Risks and challenges
Risk will include delays in launching due to unforeseen events. Typhoons and other things we cannot control that are common in the Philippines can stall the project. We will make sure that insurance is always there to avoid any risks, ensuring quality of what we do rather than delivering a half-bake product.
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Funding period
- (50 days)