本集內容

Using a smart bin to tackle food waste 用智能垃圾桶減少食物浪費

學習要點

有關“inventories 物品清單”的詞匯

邊看邊答

What advantages are there to keeping tabs on what is being thrown out?

文字稿

This commercial kitchen in central London prepares one-and-a-half thousand meals a day. It provides catering for a museum and a conference centre.

這家位于倫敦市中心的商用廚房每天要做1500多份飯菜，供應給一家博物館和一個會議中心。

Kitchens like these typically throw away 20% of the ingredients they buy. Some are thrown away as trimmings even though they are edible. And sometimes food ends up in the bin simply because it's not needed after all.

像這樣的商用廚房一般會扔掉其所采購食材總量的20%。部分剩下的配料雖然可以食用但仍被丟棄。有時甚至僅因為不再需要某配料而將之丟棄。

To stop this happening, this kitchen has been using a new piece of technology which can simply be connected to a normal bin on scales. This is what's known as a smart bin. Kitchen staff use it like a supermarket self-checkout. The idea is to keep an accurate digital record of the food being thrown out. This helps the head chef make more informed choices.

為了阻止此類情況的發生，這家廚房使用了一種把垃圾筒和電子秤相連接的新技術。這就是所謂的“智能垃圾箱”。廚房工作人員像使用超市自助結賬系統一樣，用它來保存丟棄食物量的準確數字記錄，從而幫廚師長作出更明智的食材選擇。

Bill Owen, head chef
It was a shocker how many tonnage is actually saved through using this.

By keeping tabs on exactly what kind of food is being thrown out, the chef can adjust his orders of ingredients, but also improvise whole new menus based on what was previously being thrown away.

比爾·歐文 廚師長
“讓人驚奇的是通過使用這個技術，我們節省了很多噸食材。”

通過密切留意被丟棄食物的種類，廚師可以調整配料采購訂單，同時也可以根據之前扔掉的食材來即興創作全新的菜單。

Mark Zornes, Winnow smart bins
In an operation where you make a significant amount of your food in advance, you can typically cut food waste in half.

馬克·佐恩斯 Winnow 智能垃圾桶
“對于一個可以提前大量生產食物的企業來說，使用這個技術能將其廚余垃圾減少一半。”

Do people actually have time on top of everything else to catalogue the stuff as they are putting it into the bin?

人們真的有時間在做其它工作的基礎上去記錄丟到垃圾桶的食物嗎？

Bill Owen, head chef
They do. To start with, take a little while to get used to the bin system. It is just about familiarising yourself with where the buttons are.

比爾·歐文 廚師長
“時間是有的。起初，需要花點時間來適應這個智能垃圾桶系統。熟悉各個按鍵在哪兒后就好了。”

However effective they may be there is one important factor that holds these smart bins back.

不論這些垃圾桶有多么好用，現有一個重要的因素使它們未能被大力推廣。

Andrew Stephen, CEO, Sustainable Restaurant Association
Traditionally, smart bin technology has been at quite a high price point for particularly small operators. There is only a relatively small fraction that can afford that upfront implementation.

安德魯·斯蒂芬 可持續餐飲協會 首席執行官
“一直以來，智能垃圾桶技術的價格對于小型企業來說偏高。只有一小部分企業能夠負擔的起前期安裝費用。”

It seems that smart bins are just one part of the solution to the pressing problem of food waste.

看樣子，智能垃圾箱只是解決食物浪費問題的部分答案。

詞匯

accurate record 準確的記錄

keeping tabs on 嚴密留意…動向

adjust 調整

catalogue 記錄

你知道嗎？

Every year 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted or lost globally. One quarter of this, or 325 million tonnes, would be enough to feed 870 million hungry people annually.

每年全球浪費或丟棄的糧食總量為13億噸，其中四分之一，大約3.25億噸，足以養活8億7千萬饑餓人口。

問題答案

The chef can adjust his orders of ingredients and improvise whole new menus based on what was previously being thrown away.