By: Victoria Wong

After you eat dinner, what do you and many other families do with your food scraps? Most people would throw away and discard them, but now scientists have found a way to make use of what was thrown away in the garbage.

We now have edible cement, 4 times as strong as normal cement, created by cabbage leaves from your trash cans all over the continent! This is helping to tackle food waste and global warming. Good foods for this new cement are: banana peels, onions, orange peels, tea leaves, coffee grounds, pumpkins, and cabbage.

But how does this recently developed process work? To make the new cement, the scientists dry the food waste. They then pound it into a powder. This powder is now able to then be pressed into a mold to create the ‘edible cement’.

According to a report from the UN Environment Program’s Food Waste Index, more than 900 million tons of food is wasted every year around the world. This is not just taking up space in the landfills; it is also responsible for 10% of the polluted greenhouse gas that has been floating in air.

Different from normal cement, the new food-based cement is biodegradable. This means that the edible cement would take up less space in the landfills.

The scientists in Japan also say that the food scraps can be turned back into food again, not just cement. All you have to do is break up the food and boil it! The new creation could not only be a solution to filled landfills, but we would also then be able to live in a healthier ecosystem.

Article: https://s3.amazonaws.com/appforest_uf/f1655668704488x173712310867802900/Scientists%20Find%20Way%20to%20Turn%20Food%20Waste%20into%20%E2%80%98Edible%20Cement%E2%80%99%20-%20Twinkl%20NewsRoom.pdf