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The rising cost of living is driving more consumers to look for cheaper ways to buy food, even as the country continues to throw away an estimated R61.5bn worth of food annually.A report by food-surplus marketplace Refreshi says it has helped consumers save R12.5m over the past year by selling surplus food that would otherwise have been thrown away. The platform says it has also rescued 200,000 meals from ending up in landfills since launching in Stellenbosch in March 2025.The figures come as South Africa faces dual challenges. Millions of households continue to battle rising food costs, while edible food worth billions of rand is discarded annually. According to Refreshi, the country sends about 10.3-million tonnes of edible food to landfills annually, with organic waste making up more than half of all general waste.Refreshi operates an app that connects consumers with outlets that have surplus food available at the end of the day. Shoppers buy “Surprise Bags” through the app and collect them during a scheduled pickup window, allowing retailers to recover some value from food that would otherwise be discarded. The company said demand from shoppers and retailers has accelerated over the past year.Its partner network has expanded from 35 stores when it launched to about 700 stores, with 10-15 new partner stores joining the platform weekly by July.“The growth has been driven by strong consumer demand and retailer appetite to recover value from surplus rather than write it off entirely,” it said. The company said the platform has generated R10m in recovered revenue for retailers while attracting more than 200,000 registered users. It also says more than 20,000 meals are rescued monthly through the platform. Refreshi’s partner network now includes grocery stores, convenience stores, bakeries, coffee shops, restaurants and hotels, reflecting how widespread food surplus is across the retail sector. The growth has been driven by strong consumer demand and retailer appetite to recover value from surplus rather than write it off entirely.— RefreshiRefreshi has also expanded beyond its Western Cape launch base into Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and parts of the Eastern Cape, making the service available across South Africa’s major urban centres. Beyond consumer savings, the report highlights the environmental effect of reducing food waste. It estimates that “rescuing about 1kg of food per Surprise Bag sold” has prevented about 500,000kg of carbon dioxide emissions, conserved about 120-million litres of water and saved about 400,000m2 of agricultural land over the past year.The company says it is positioning itself alongside, rather than in place of, South Africa’s existing food rescue organisations. It has partnered with FoodForward SA and says its commercial model is intended to help keep surplus food in circulation when donation channels are not able to absorb it quickly enough. The initiative is also aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goal of halving food waste by 2030. Refreshi plans to continue expanding its network. The company says its long-term ambition is to grow to more than 2,000 partner stores, rescue millions of meals every year and build what it describes as the country’s “largest circular economy marketplace” for surplus food.Business Day
