Research Matrix

Research Question: How effective is it for governments to employ pricing

mechanisms on corporations and households to limit food waste in developed
countries?
Source 1
Author Sabinne Lee

Author’s credibility Sabinne Lee is an associate research fellow at the Korea Institute
of Public Administration (KIPA), where she has expertise in public
management, environmental policy, and incentive theory.

Date November 8, 2017

Titles of source( MLA) “Exploring Effective Incentive Design to Reduce Food Waste: A
Natural Experiment of Policy Change from Community Based
Charge to RFID Based Weight Charge”

Source Type Academic Article

Main Idea Lee intended to assess the impact of the Household-Based Food
Waste Charging System (RHWC) utilizing Radio Frequency
Identification (RFID) technology on the quantity of food waste
produced in a specific neighborhood in Seoul. The study compares
food waste disposal between apartment complexes with RHWC
policies and those without, highlighting the efficacy and efficiency of
the pricing mechanism in curbing food waste.

Conclusions The authors’ conclusion suggests that the adoption of the RFID and
RHWC pricing policies by the municipality in South Korea,
particularly in Mapo-Gu district, has a significant impact on
reducing food waste. The findings show that compared to the
Community-Based Waste Charging System (CWC), which employs
a group incentive system, the RHWC design, which uses
individual-based incentives to monitor and charge households
based on the weight of food waste, is more effective in reducing
food waste.
The article concludes that municipalities can address
environmental and public health challenges related to food waste,
without much drawback, by implementing economic waste
reduction strategies.

Tag Words ● Food waste

● Waste pricing mechanism
● Household tax
● Incentives
● CWC policy
MLA Citation Lee, Sabinne, and Kwangho Jung. “Exploring Effective Incentive
Design to Reduce Food Waste: A Natural Experiment of Policy
Change from Community Based Charge to RFID Based Weight
Charge.” MDPI, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, 8 Nov.
2017, www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/11/2046. Accessed 6 Dec.
2023.

Notes/Source URL (get https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/11/2046

PermaLink for Database
sources)/etc.

How will this be used in I can incorporate the article’s approach and study in assessing the
your paper? impact of the Household-Based Food Waste Charging System
(RHWC) with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) in a developed
country (South Korea), emphasizing its success in reducing food
waste. In addition, I will emphasize the transferability of these
results to developed countries, indicating that similar pricing
mechanisms could be adopted to encourage responsible waste
disposal practices. Furthermore, I can describe that the success
and sustainability of the RHWC model can most likely be replicated
in developed nations with similar waste management needs. Lastly,
these policies used in this article can also be synthesized with
another similar approach by describing similar conditions of food
waste.

Source 2
Author Bhagyashree Katare

Author’s credibility Bhagyashree Katare is an Associate Professor, with a Doctorate in

Applied Economics, affiliated with Purdue University's Department
of Agricultural Economics. She teaches and conducts research at
Purdue in the economics of food, health, and nutrition, particularly
on the empirical analysis of consumption behavior.

Date February 21, 2017

Titles of source( MLA) “Social-Optimal Household Food Waste: Taxes and Government
Incentives”

Source Type Academic Journal

Main Idea The author’s main idea is that the ideal amount of food waste,
capital needed for food preservation, and related expenses build a
basis for decisions about household food waste. By highlighting
how households react to disposal levies and government
 incentives, it draws attention to the inverse relationship between
the elasticity of food waste and capital preservation.

Conclusions The authors conclude that disposal taxes can potentially be

valuable tools for changing American households’ food waste
habits. The developed model indicates a possible way to deal with
the nation’s problem of excessive food waste by implying that
increased disposal taxes result in fewer food purchases and
destruction. The results highlight how financial incentives, like
taxes, can influence consumer behavior and promote a more
environmentally friendly method of consuming and discarding food.

Tag Words ● Food waste

● Taxes
● Policy externalities
● Social welfare
● Sustainability

MLA Citation Katare, Bhagyashree, et al. “Social-Optimal Household Food

Waste: Taxes and Government Incentives.” American Journal of
Agricultural Economics, vol. 99, no. 2, 21 Feb. 2017, pp. 499–509,
doi:10.1093/ajae/aaw114. Accessed 6 Dec. 2023.

Notes/Source URL (get https://doi.org/10.1093/ajae/aaw114

PermaLink for Database
sources)/etc.

How will this be used in I can utilize the academic model as a framework to evaluate how
your paper? government pricing mechanisms, such as disposal taxes and
incentives, impact household decisions on food waste. Specifically,
I can assess the elasticity of household responses to changes in
disposal taxes and preservation capital costs, analyzing their
effectiveness in achieving optimal outcomes for reducing food
waste. In addition, the responses from households and food waste
issue matches with my other sources, and as a result, I will
synthesize the perspectives to show the effectiveness of such
pricing policies.