This 11 Year Old’s Invention May Be The Solution To Food Waste

A recent study showed that people who eat more fruits and vegetables (aka healthy people) are the ones responsible for most of the food waste that occurs (because they’re perishable, ya know). However, 11-year-old Rumaan Malik, a pupil at Grasby All Saints Primary School in Lincolnshire has invented an ‘Alarm Cup’ which will alert you when food items are about to expire (so you don’t waste the 10 quid you spent on avocados).

Rumaan said that she came up with the novel idea, that won Ocado’s Food Waste Challenge award after she made a connect that was close to home. She said: “I started thinking about what we throw away at home and what would help us stop this happening. Apples are my favourite fruit, but they were always going all soft when my mum left them out in the fruit bowl and forgot about them.

“That’s when I thought of my idea and started drawing the Alarm Cup. I thought that we all need something that could help us use up our fruit by sounding an alarm before it goes off, instead of letting it end up in the bin. I couldn’t believe it when my teacher told me I had won!”

Rumaan’s alarm cup has a mini touchscreen that contains items of food produce as well as recipes to use up your excess food such as banana bread. Helen White, special advisor on household food waste at WRAP, said: “We were particularly impressed by Rumaan’s invention as it addresses one of the key issues behind food waste: behavioural patterns.

“The process of buying food without paying attention to expiry dates, leading to their disposal, is something we’re all guilty of from time to time, and it has become a habit for many. The Alarm Cup challenges this, disrupting the pattern and helping people unlearn the subconscious behaviours that cause household food waste.”