How can a beer company inspire positive action to restore nature?

British brewery, Toast Ale, has launched a new beer brewed with surplus bread and surplus, wonky mangoes.

Mango IPA is a collaboration with UK veg box company Oddbox and fruit juice brand Flawsome as part of Toast’s Rise Up campaign for COP26. Launched on Earth Day, the beer hopes to raise awareness of the environmental impact of our food systems and inspire positive action for change.

Fixing the food system

The beer’s focus is on how we can reverse biodiversity loss by fixing the food system – starting with food waste. Food production is the biggest contributor to climate change and biodiversity loss but one-third of all food is wasted.

Mango IPA is a limited edition brewed with surplus fresh bread (Toast’s signature style) and surplus mangoes that would otherwise have been wasted. This prevents food waste and reduces the environmental footprint of the beer.

Why is there surplus fruit?

Surplus fruit exists because sometimes there is more available than the retailer’s order; trees take years to grow and produce fruit so it’s not possible to grow to order. Sometimes the fruit is too small, too big, the wrong shape or colour.

For this beer, Oddbox sourced the ‘too many’ and Flawsome sourced and pulped the wonky.

Toast’s beer is the fourth beer of its Rise Up series, which raises awareness about the environmental impact of our food system and celebrates the benefits to us all by supporting better, healthier ways of producing our food.

Toast’s co-founder & Chief Operating Officer, Louisa Ziane, explained: “We’re really happy to be collaborating with our B Corp friends Oddbox and Flawsome to create a delicious beer that prevents mangoes from being wasted.

We love to celebrate positive solutions to big problems and ultimately reducing food waste is the simplest, most equitable action we can all be part of.”

This story shows how Toast Ale supports Goal 12: Responsible Consumption and Production, specifically Target 12.3: “By 2030, halve per capita global good waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses.”

About Toast Ale

Toast Ale brews planet-saving beer using surplus fresh bread. This prevents food waste, and reduces the demand for malted barley, and thereby the demand for land, water and energy. Toast open sources a recipe for home brewers and collaborates with breweries all over the world to scall its impact. All its profits go to charities fixing the food system. Toast is a social enterprise and the first UK brewery to become a B Corp.

In the lead up to COP26, Toast is releasing a series of limited edition beers with fellow B Corps Divine Chocolate, teapigs, Hobbs House Bakery, Oddbox, Rebel Kitchen, Rubies in the Rubble and Cafedirect. Each beer will highlight an element of the ecological crisis, and the change needed to the food system to meet the goals set in the Paris Agreement at COP21.