The Challenge

Fruit is highly perishable (FAO et al., 2026), and much of it never reaches a plate. Globally, fruit and vegetables have the highest loss rate of any food group: 25.4% is lost between harvest and the shop, almost double the 13.3% average for all food (FAO, 2025). Food losses are highest in sub-Saharan Africa, at 23% (FAO, 2025). For perishable crops, losses there often exceed 50% where storage and cold chains are limited (FAO et al., 2026).

In Kenya, earlier estimates put mango losses at 25 to 44% along the value chain (Ridolfi, Hoffmann and Baral, 2018). Bananas are also lost after harvest (FAO, 2014). Outside supermarkets, they are stored and displayed without cooling. Some wholesalers store and ripen them in iron-roofed sheds, where daytime temperatures reach 36°C, and some street sellers leave them in direct sun. In these conditions, bananas last 5 days instead of 1 to 2 weeks (FAO, 2014). Bruising also makes fruit give off ethylene, a gas that triggers ripening, and lets in disease, shortening its shelf life (FAO, 2014).

This damage cuts traders’ income. Poor handling is the biggest cause of quality loss in dessert bananas. Together with poor storage and uneven ripening, it cuts the market value of the fruit by 30 to 50%, reducing what wholesalers and retailers earn all year round (FAO, 2014). Across low-income countries, post-harvest losses of perishable foods also push up prices for consumers (FAO et al., 2026).

Every spoiled fruit also wastes the land and water used to grow it (FAO, 2013). Fruit accounts for 18% of the blue water footprint of global food loss and waste (FAO, 2013). Blue water is the water in rivers, lakes and underground aquifers (UN ESCWA, n.d.). Fruit wastage is also a blue water hotspot in Europe (FAO, 2013).

The same problem reaches Ireland. Fruit and vegetables are the largest source of food waste on Irish farms (EPA, 2026). A 2019 study found that fruit makes up 16% of food waste in Irish supermarkets, second only to vegetables (EPA, 2026). A 2025 update to EU waste law requires Member States, by 2030, to cut food waste by 10% in processing and manufacturing, and by 30% per person across retail, restaurants, food services and households, compared with 2021–2023 levels (European Commission, n.d.).

A Circular Solution

Karpolax was created by two Ugandan entrepreneurs who developed their invention while studying agricultural sciences at Makerere University in Kampala (Uganda) (European Patent Office, 2025). It is a biodegradable sachet that slows down spoilage, so fruit keeps for longer (European Patent Office, 2025).

Tucked into fruit packaging, the sachet gives off natural vapours drawn from cloves, lemongrass, eucalyptus and wintergreen. These vapours hold back ripening by cutting the amount of ethylene the fruit releases, and shield it from mould, fungi and bacteria (European Patent Office, 2025). In pilot tests with Uganda’s National Agricultural Research Organisation, mangoes stayed fresh for 33 days instead of 11 (European Patent Office, 2025). It has also worked on bananas, apples and oranges, and versions for pineapples, peppers and berries are in development (European Patent Office, 2025).

Karpolax says its sachet is for farmers, transporters, packers and retailers. Users simply drop a sachet into a box of fruit (Karpolax, n.d.). The sachet works without refrigeration. In sub-Saharan Africa, where access to cold storage is limited, post-harvest losses hit smallholder farmers hardest (European Patent Office, 2025).

The EPA’s Food Use and Waste Hierarchy ranks ways of dealing with surplus food in order of preference, with prevention first as the most effective way to reduce food waste (EPA, 2026). Karpolax works at this top level by keeping fruit as food for longer, using a natural alternative to synthetic preservatives (European Patent Office, 2025).

Environmental, Social and Economic Impact

Karpolax launched in 2020 and, by 2023, had worked with over 100 farmers, 20 exporters and 250 market vendors. According to the EPO, over the same period its sachets prevented more than one million tonnes of fruit from going to waste (European Patent Office, 2025). Fruit that stays fresh also saves the land and water used to grow it (FAO, 2013). Because the sachets need no refrigeration, they add none of the extra energy use that expanding cold storage may bring (FAO, 2019).

Longer-lasting fruit also improves access to food. According to UNICEF, Karpolax has enabled over 250,000 people to access fruit and vegetables in a year. UNICEF notes that, by extending the shelf life of produce, Karpolax can give children and families sustained access to nutritious fruit, even in the face of climate change (UNICEF, 2023). In 2025, this work earned the founders the European Patent Office’s Community Healers prize, which recognises solutions for food security and social equity (European Patent Office, 2025).

For the people who grow and sell fruit, less spoilage means more to sell. Co-founder Samuel Muyita says, “We have seen a reduction in wastage of over 40%.” He adds that in Uganda, “if farmers are not using Karpolax, they are not using anything” (European Patent Office, 2025). Fruit that lasts weeks rather than days gives traders and vendors more time to reach buyers, instead of having to sell cheaply before it spoils. The sachet also offers a low-cost alternative to synthetic preservatives (European Patent Office, 2025).

Replicability

Karpolax is one of a growing number of innovations that keep fresh produce edible for longer. Around the world, companies are tackling food loss at different points in the supply chain, from the farm to the shop shelf.

• Apeel Sciences (USA) makes a plant-based coating that keeps fruit and vegetables fresh for longer, as an alternative to waxes and plastic packaging. According to Independent Retail Europe, an association of retail groups, German retailer EDEKA reported a 50% drop in avocado waste and a 20% increase in avocado sales in a 2020 pilot in about 2,900 of its stores. It then rolled out Apeel produce to more than 11,000 stores (European Commission, 2020). 

  
  

• ColdHubs (Nigeria) cuts post-harvest losses of fruit, vegetables and other perishable food using solar-powered cold rooms placed at key points along the supply chain. It links these to temperature-controlled transport and supplies sturdy plastic crates to reduce damage in transit. 

  
  

• It’s Fresh! (UK) developed RYPEN, a packaging technology that controls ethylene, the gas that makes fruit ripen. Growers, packers and retailers use it to keep fresh produce on the shelf for longer. 

  
  

• Hazel Technologies (USA) makes products that slow the natural processes that spoil fresh produce. Without touching the fruit, they adjust the conditions around it to slow ripening and protect against gases and mould. Hazel offers solutions tailored to more than 15 different fruits and vegetables.