Systemic Quantification And Cascading Biorefinery Engineering Of School Meal Plate Waste
Main Article Content
Abstract
School feeding programs generate large volumes of plate waste, yet most decentralized programs cannot produce comparable and auditable measurements of what is served, consumed, and discarded. Existing research on food-waste measurement, waste valorization, and sustainability assessment has developed largely as separate streams. This study develops and documents an auditable four-layer framework that links standardized Edge AI computer-vision quantification of school meal plate waste with material characterization, a five-stream cascading bio-valorization pathway, and system-level evaluation, within Indonesia's Makan Bergizi Gratis (MBG) program. The quantitative, engineering based design covers 50 schools in East Java across five operational zones and 1,200 matched tray pairs, with image-based mass estimates validated against physical scale weights using R², MAE, and MAPE. Waste fractions are characterized through proximate and ultimate analysis and routed to biodiesel, hydroxyapatite, black soldier fly larvae bioconversion, anaerobic digestion, and biochar-compost. Life-cycle and techno economic assessments evaluate the system at a 10 ton/day regional scale. The analysis indicates that standardization at the data-acquisition stage improves downstream comparability and that measured fractions can be linked to differentiated recovery pathways. The numerical results are project reported, the sampling frame is limited to East Java, and the LCA and TEA outputs remain scenario dependent
Article Details
Section
References
Abadi, M. N. P., Basrowi, R. W., Gunawan, W. B., Arasy, M. P., Nurjihan, F., Sundjaya, T., Pratiwi, D., Hardinsyah, H., Taslim, N. A., & Nurkolis, F. (2025). Unraveling future trends in free school lunch and nutrition: Global insights for Indonesia from bibliometric approach and critical review. Nutrients, 17(17), 2777. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu17172777
Aschemann-Witzel, J., de Hooge, I., Amani, P., Bech-Larsen, T., & Oostindjer, M. (2015). Consumer-related food waste: Causes and potential for action. Sustainability, 7(6), 6457–6477. https://doi.org/10.3390/su7066457
Bernstad, A., & la Cour Jansen, J. (2012). Review of comparative LCAs of food waste management systems – Current status and potential improvements. Waste Management, 32(12), 2439–2455.
Canakci, M. (2007). The potential of restaurant waste lipids as biodiesel feedstocks. Bioresource Technology, 98(1), 183–190.
Cohen, J. F. W., Richardson, S., Parker, E., Catalano, P. J., & Rimm, E. B. (2014). Impact of the new U.S. Department of Agriculture school meal standards on food selection, consumption, and waste. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 46(4), 388–394.
Diener, S., Zurbrügg, C., & Tockner, K. (2009). Conversion of organic material by black soldier fly larvae: Establishing optimal feeding rates. Waste Management & Research, 27(6), 603–610.
Kareem, Z., & Eyiler, E. (2024). Synthesis of hydroxyapatite from eggshells via wet chemical precipitation: A review. RSC Advances, 14(30), 21439–21452. https://doi.org/10.1039/d4ra02198c
Lin, C. S. K., Pfaltzgraff, L. A., Herrero-Davila, L., Mubofu, E. B., Abderrahim, S., Clark, J. H., Koutinas, A. A., Kopsahelis, N., Stamatelatou, K., Dickson, F., Thankappan, S., Mohamed, Z., Brocklesby, R., & Luque, R. (2013). Food waste as a valuable resource for the production of chemicals, materials and fuels. Current situation and global perspective. Energy & Environmental Science, 6(2), 426–464.
Lo, F. P. W., Sun, Y., Qiu, J., & Lo, B. (2020). Image-based food classification and volume estimation for dietary assessment: A review. IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, 24(7), 1926–1939. https://doi.org/10.1109/JBHI.2020.2987943
Niaki, S. F., Moore, C. E., Chen, T.-A., & Weber Cullen, K. (2017). Younger elementary school students waste more school lunch foods than older elementary school students. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, 117(1), 95–101.
Salomone, R., Saija, G., Mondello, G., Giannetto, A., Fasulo, S., & Savastano, D. (2017). Environmental impact of food waste bioconversion by insects: Application of Life Cycle Assessment to process using Hermetia illucens. Journal of Cleaner Production, 140, 890–905.
Smith, S. L., & Cunningham-Sabo, L. (2014). Food choice, plate waste and nutrient intake of elementary- and middle-school students participating in the US National School Lunch Program. Public Health Nutrition, 17(6), 1255–1263.
Suprapto, F. A., Praditya, E., & Dewi, R. M. (2025). A policy implementation review of the Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) program. The Journal of Indonesia Sustainable Development Planning, 6(2), 297–312.
Tahir, G. A., & Loo, C. K. (2021). A comprehensive survey of image-based food recognition and volume estimation methods for dietary assessment. Healthcare, 9(12), 1676. https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare9121676
Verguet, S., Limasalle, P., Chakrabarti, A., Husain, A., Burbano, C., Drake, L., & Bundy, D. A.
P. (2020). The broader economic value of school feeding programs in low- and middle-income countries: Estimating the multi-sectoral returns to public health, human capital, social protection, and the local economy. Frontiers in Public Health, 8, Article 587046. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2020.587046
Williamson, D. A., Allen, H. R., Martin, P. D., Alfonso, A. J., Gerald, B., & Hunt, A. (2003). Comparison of digital photography to weighed and visual estimation of portion sizes. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 103(9), 1139–1145.
Zhang, R., El-Mashad, H. M., Hartman, K., Wang, F., Liu, G., Choate, C., & Gamble, P. (2007). Characterization of food waste as feedstock for anaerobic digestion. Bioresource Technology, 98(4), 929–935. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2006.02.039
Garrido-Jurado, S., Muñoz-Salinas, R., Madrid-Cuevas, F. J., & Marín-Jiménez, M. J. (2014). Automatic generation and detection of highly reliable fiducial markers under occlusion. Pattern Recognition, 47(6), 2280–2292. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.patcog.2014.01.005
Kareem, Z., & Eyiler, E. (2024). Synthesis of hydroxyapatite from eggshells via wet chemical precipitation: A review. RSC Advances, 14(30), 21439–21452. https://doi.org/10.1039/D4RA02198C
Lo, F. P.-W., Sun, Y., Qiu, J., & Lo, B. (2018). Food volume estimation based on deep learning view synthesis from a single depth map. Nutrients, 10(12), Article 2005. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu10122005
Mertenat, A., Diener, S., & Zurbrügg, C. (2019). Black soldier fly biowaste treatment – Assessment of global warming potential. Waste Management, 84, 173–181. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2018.11.040
Morales-Polo, C., Cledera-Castro, M. del M., & Moratilla, B. Y. (2018). Reviewing the anaerobic digestion of food waste: From waste generation and anaerobic process to its perspectives. Applied Sciences, 8(10), Article 1804. https://doi.org/10.3390/app8101804
Muthmainnah, F. S., Budiningsari, D., Hardiyanti, M., Prawiningdyah, Y., & Aulia, J. N. (2025). Keterkaitan kesukaan dan pengetahuan tentang food waste terhadap jumlah sisa makanan makan siang siswa sekolah dasar. Jurnal Gizi Klinik Indonesia, 22(1), 41–51. https://doi.org/10.22146/ijcn.116242
Naser El Deen, S., van Rozen, K., Elissen, H., van Wikselaar, P., Fodor, I., van der Weide, R., Hoek-van den Hil, E. F., Rezaei Far, A., & Veldkamp, T. (2023). Bioconversion of different waste streams of animal and vegetal origin and manure by black soldier fly larvae Hermetia illucens L. (Diptera: Stratiomyidae). Insects, 14(2), Article 204. https://doi.org/10.3390/insects14020204
Yaakob, Z., Mohammad, M., Alherbawi, M., Alam, Z., & Sopian, K. (2013). Overview of the production of biodiesel from waste cooking oil. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 18, 184–193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2012.10.016