By Sal Ahmed
BERLIN (AA) — GEME, a Belgium-based company, claims to manufacture the world's first bio-waste electric composters for industrial and domestic use.
The process starts by adding food waste, such as leftovers, cooking scraps like tomato stems, apple or potato peels, and even meat. A bit of initiator, which is essentially bacteria, is added. Then, the lid is closed, and the composting process begins.
Within several hours, the compost is ready — fertile enough for use in the garden to improve plant growth or for sale to farmers for commercial use.
Sales Manager Brooke Waters explains that normally, composting bio-waste takes about 12-18 months.
"You have to leave it in your garden, you have to mix it with spades, it needs all of the different four seasons, heat and rain to turn into actual compost," he told Anadolu.
"Most people now just throw their food waste away and that's it. Now we've started to rethink what we are going to do with it that would benefit us."
Besides use in the garden, compost can also be sold to farmers to benefit the soil of their fields.
"There are restaurants that will be using this unit, elderly homes, schools, we have bigger units for different industries," added Waters.
GEME says its vision is to transform waste into a resource and create a world where nature thrives alongside human progress. The company believes that its biotechnology can provide tangible benefits.
In the German market, nearly 11 million tons of food is wasted every year, mostly by households which account for nearly 60%. This includes edible food and organic residues such as peels, leaves, bones or coffee grounds.
Restaurants and communal and general catering account for a further 17% of food waste, followed by 15% from food processing and 7% from retail.
Waters highlighted the impact the unit could have on waste management, due to its suitability for widespread individual use, reducing food waste into usable compost, contributing to more sustainable practices for households and industries alike.