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NOWA

JingYi, Mile, Lei, Nattanun Sainont

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NoWa - Circular Food Design, this is the three-day group project representing an all-in-one RCA canteen service system that enables students to make the perfect decision about types and portions of food to cut down the waste that you left on the plates and at the same time save money and time. 

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This is some shocking truth about food waste.

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How might we reduce the food left on people’s plates, using the food system in the RCA canteen as a play-field to develop our ideas?

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First of all we find out the problems that cause food left on the plates ad came up with solutions. for the consumption part, wrong portion size, lack of awareness of waste-producing, unsatisfying menus are the three main problems that we spotted through interviews and on-site research. our solution for those problems is as allows. We designed a portion measuring plate to help students get the right amount of food that they can finish, we resigned the bin into a smarter one to collect data of the amount of waste each person produces to raise a concern about the problem and give discount back, and also we developed an application on which students can vote for their menus, this would add to the sense of engagement of students which would make them think that “I choose the food so I’m gonna finish that”. The system can also benefit the RCA canteen by providing feedback and prediction in the process of food preparation.

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This presents all main touchpoints and activities users need to interact with our system.

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My friend Lux is also going to join us. She is a 25-year-old GID student who is super environmentally conscious and wanna save some money for her Christmas holidays.

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In the past, she always found the food in the RCA canteen not that good and the portion was always too big for her.

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And also she can have her lunch in a real small portion which she would be able to finish.

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Lux is in a super intense course so the lunch break is usually short. But Nowa allows her to order her lunch online. Focused on positive outcomes - not framing things in the past or emphasizing missteps.

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NoWa also allow Lux to pay in advance and collect it on-site, also it provides suggestion for the right portion for her by tracking her energy consumption in the morning.

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One thing that Lux likes the most is the Nowa plate on which there are portion guidance lines for staff, different prices for different portions and information about food waste. Lux tried very hard to finish all the food but there is still a little bit left on the plate.

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So she needs to put them into the smart bin. 

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All she needs to do is just tapping her student ID on to the touching screen on the bin.the bin is going to be unlocked. So she needs to put them into the smart bin. 

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After putting all the food waste into the bin and returning the plate to the shelf, the weight of the food she wasted would be measured by the bin.

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Every time she is putting lots of food into the bin, she feels kinda anxious and guilty because data of her daily food waste is tracked and turned into weekly, monthly charts and all her friends can view.

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As we can see, Lux is doing a better job than the average, so she’s got some discount points to use in her meal, which encourages her to finish every meal. Lux is surprised to find that Nowa not only provides her with great suggestions and a lot of convenience when having lunch, but also it raises her awareness about the problem of food waste. She can see a more eco-friendly food system in the RCA canteen with the help of NoWa.

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