Kyushu Seino Transportation and Refecco, which operates Yume Solar in Kyushu, announced that they have officially launched an initiative on October 9th in collaboration with Fukuoka City Zoo to effectively utilize discarded fruits and vegetables as animal food.
<(Left) An elephant eating bananas that arrived (Fukuoka City Zoo) and (Right) An initiative to reduce waste through the power of logistics>
The first delivery included fruits and vegetables that animals like, such as cabbage and bananas.
The project involves Kyushu Seino Transportation transporting unsaleable produce from the Costco Hisayama warehouse store to Fukuoka City Zoo, with Refec subsidizing the transportation costs. Approximately three cases of produce are scheduled to be delivered once a week, contributing to the reduction of about three tons of produce waste per year (equivalent to 30 days' worth of feed for one elephant).
Kyushu Seino Transportation and Costco Hisayama Warehouse have been collaborating since February 2025 to transport discarded fruits and vegetables to Nagasaki Bio Park, and this marks the second food waste reduction project undertaken by both companies.
By advancing this initiative, we believe we can provide new added value beyond transportation, and contribute to solving environmental problems and serving the local community. LIFECO is also working to solve environmental problems, and as part of its local environmental promotion project, it donated a solar power generation system to the Fukuoka City Zoological and Botanical Garden Office in December 2024. Given this background, LIFECO has decided to endorse and sponsor Kyushu Seino Transportation's activities.
Moving forward, both companies will use the effective utilization of discarded fruits and vegetables as a starting point to continue their long-term efforts to address environmental issues across industries and work towards creating new value. They plan to expand this business horizontally, leading to further growth and the establishment of a sustainable resource recycling model.
