Ricardo Valles, a student at Tecnológico de Monterrey, as part of the Orion Startups program, presented his venture “Savefruit," an initiative that was born out of the need to find mechanisms that, in addition to preserving food for longer, would contribute to the growing global problem of food waste.

"Many people think that the solution to food waste is to continue consuming, when what we need is to preserve what we already have," Valles told Entrepreneur when asked about his venture.

How Does it Work?

The secret of this initiative lies in the biotechnological product that Valles and his team developed to delay the maturation process, a technique that preserves freshness and allows the quality and properties of food to be preserved, something that grocery companies can undoubtedly take advantage of, which can reduce costs, increase profits and reduce waste.

"With Savefruit, the life of a fruit can be extended by up to 130%. For example, the avocado has an average life of 7 to 8 days. With our product it lasts from 18 to 24 days. In this way, stores or exporters have long enough to market the fruit and for it to reach the final consumer in good condition," Valles described to the publication.

Battle Against Waste

Taking into account a 2020 World Bank report socialized by Entrepreneur, each year 20.4 million tons of food are wasted in Mexico, most of these due to lack of conservation in the fruits and vegetables that are lost each year.

This bleak scenario was what encouraged Valles to develop his venture, not only to prevent food from being lost in the midst of so many needs, but also to reduce carbon emissions produced by the food industry.

Savefruit has already applied its product to more than 60 million kilograms of food, including apples, tomatoes, avocados, bananas, and papayas, which has allowed Mexican merchants to export their product to six more countries by sea, something unthinkable years before.

Growing Investment in the U.S.

Having a business model based on direct sales to specialized distributors located in strategic locations in the country, Savefruit recently launched a Seed round for $500,000, reaching 70% with investors from the United States.