Processing of food wastes.

Every year almost 45 billion kg of fresh vegetables, fruits, milk, and grain products is lost to waste in the United States. According to the EPA, the disposal of this costs approximately $1 billion. In the United Kingdom, 20 million ton of food waste is produced annually. Every tonne of food waste means 4.5 ton of CO(2) emissions. The food wastes are generated largely by the fruit-and-vegetable/olive oil, fermentation, dairy, meat, and seafood industries. The aim of this chapter is to emphasize existing trends in the food waste processing technologies during the last 15 years. The chapter consists of three major parts, which distinguish recovery of added-value products (the upgrading concept), the food waste treatment technologies as well as the food chain management for sustainable food system development. The aim of the final part is to summarize recent research on user-oriented innovation in the food sector, emphasizing on circular structure of a sustainable economy.