Reelfruit, with its dried fruit snacks, is stemming this wastage while tapping into the market. Inefficient processing and drying, poor storage, and insufficient infrastructure all contribute to fruit wastage. And of all the foods wasted, fruits and vegetables make up almost 50% of it. In sub-Saharan Africa, we waste $4bn worth of food per year, more than enough to feed 48 million people, according to the UN. To put it in perspective, that’s $940bn worth of food! About 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted per year, globally. In every continent, food waste is a problem.
Globally, almost half of the fruit we harvest each year is wasted. The round was led by Alitheia IDF, with support from other investors including Samata Capital and Flying Doctor Healthcare Investment Company. The Nigerian agritech startup has raised $3m in Series A Funding to expand the production capacity of its dried fruit products. There are a lot of mouth-watering funding announcements that have been made this year, but Reelfruit’s is by far the most digestible one.