Carrefour Group has established a new food advisory committee, whose members include the founder of a food waste app as well as Danone CEO Emmanuel Faber.

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The French conglomerate wants to set itself up as a leader in the transformation of food, saying the committee will support Carrefour as it transforms its model by “participating in concrete projects linked to the food transition, sharing best practices, proposing new ideas, and leading forward-looking discussions about changes in food consumption.”

 

The committee will be chaired by Laurent Vallée, who in January was placed in charge of spearheading the transformation across the Carrefour Group. “This committee is made up of seven people from outside the group, all from different backgrounds, but committed to addressing the food-related challenges we are facing,” Carrefour said in a press release.

 

They include Emmanuel Faber, the CEO of Danone, who Carrefour described as “a key partner who will help us implement the food transition for all”. Other experts on the committee include Lucie Basch, the founder of a food waste app that puts retailers in touch with consumers, who can then collect unsold stock, preventing it from going to waste; as well as Caroline Robert, an oncologist at the Gustave Roussy cancer research institute in Paris, whose inclusion reflects the growing association between diet and disease.

 

The group also includes a farmer, a chef, an agricultural expert, and the developer of Open Food, an open-source platform that brings together farmers, restaurant owners and members of the public. Myriam Bouré co-founded Open Food as a means of creating short, independent distribution channels – one of a number of recent food-tech developments that brings the producer closer to the consumer.