India : a solution against food wastage

In India, a restaurant revolutionize the doggy bag concept by reducing food wastage and helping people in need. Indeed, Pappadavada (really popular restaurant in Kochi, Kerala state) encourages its customers and passers-by to put their scraps in a fridge, which is outside the restaurant, to allow starving people to sustain. Minu Pauline, owner of the restaurant, had this idea after seeing someone rummaging about in a bin. She realized she was generating a lot of scraps everyday with her restaurant. This is how she decided to place a fridge in front of her restaurant to permit people to use it and serve themselves food.

The fridge is open 24/7 ans is filled as by restaurant owners' donations as by Kochi citizens' donations. Minu Pauline drops off by her own from 75 to 80 food portions per day, and it is far from being enough. The fridge is not locked and the Pappadavada owner asks people to write on the wrapping when the product has been dropped off. It enables users to know how long the food has been in the fridge and those who are in need can serve themselves as much as they want.

Interviewed by the Huffington Post, Minu Pauline declared : "Money is yours, but resources belong to the world. This is the message I want to convey. If you want to waste your money, that is your problem, but you can't waste resources of the world. Don't waste resources, don't waste food".

Here is a good initiative locally set up against food wastage !

Australian mail service tests drone delivery

In Australia, Australian mail services hopes to develop and generalize little parcels delivery by drone in years to come. During AFR Business Summit that has taken place in March in Sydney, Ahmed Fahour (Australian Post CEO) has affirmed the staff was currently testing little parcels delivery (a maximum of 1,2 kilograms) thanks to drones. Australian Post has the support of civilian aviation in order to guarantee the security of the customers.

Designed by ARI Labs and remote piloted thanks to a high definition camera direction, this new kind of delivery could be particularly useful for country person whose houses are far from their letter box. The delivery driver could start the drone from the place he/she is parked to do a fifteen kilometers flight.

The Australian Post CEO declared "Although this project is fascinating, we take the security very seriously. The drone delivery will be officially declared when we will be 100% sure our system is reliable".

The current tests will be done over a two-weeks period? The objective is to deliver about fifty addressees twice a week. To reassure Australian people, Australia Post explains that drones will be equipped of a parachute, an alarm and a light. For now, ARI Labs engineers need to supervise the drone trajectory but they hope they will be able to automatize this part of the process in years to come.

Flashy green rivers in France

Monday, 25th of April :

This morning, French people from twelve different French departments woke up noticing the colour of some rivers have changed. Indeed fluorescine, an inoffensive colourant, has been poured into the water by an environmental federation in order to warn people about the lack of resources allocated to the pollution struggle.

Outside the fourth environmental conference (following on from COP21 conference), environmental activists have decided to make a national impact and led the "Green River Mission". Twelve French departments are concerned with the fake pollution designed to raise awareness (Paris, Ardèche, Aude, Haute-Savoie, Orne, Calvados, Gard, Ille-et-Vilaine, Finistère, Landes, Moselle and Cher).

Indeed, the activist leaders declare pollution struggle is far from being a national priority as its budget has been cut by around 10%. They disapprove of the difference between what politicians say and what they concretely set up.

This mission makes itself heard and make an impression on French people who perhaps are not careful enough of the environment. On social medias, numerous pictures of French flashy green rivers have been posted via #rivieresvertes hashtag.

SPYCE KITCHEN, a new way to eat

MIT engineering students (in Boston, USA) have invented a fully-automated robot that could be your new chef! It is called SPYCE KITCHEN and features several elements such as a refrigerator, a dishwasher, a stovetop and a robot chef that cooks and serves meals.

Indeed, the fully-equipped robot can prepare meals composed of fresh food at the disposal of users. The ingredients are stocked by the SPYCE staff daily to offer fresh products to the users. All they have to do is to choose their order by using the dedicated mobile and tablet app. They can customize their entire meal, from the different ingredients to the sauce they want. The quantity can also be chosen. When the order is validated, they are transported to one of four automated pots that mix and cook the ingredients all-in-one. Once the meal is ready to eat, it is dispensed on a plate and the pot cleans itself.
This invention could definitely revolutionize our way to eat and represent a new alternative to fast-foods. Despite its small size (two square meters), the SPYCE KITCHEN would be able to produce the half of the production per day of a standard fast food.