Literature review on waste management of online food delivery industry in China

Meituan Waimai,which was officially launched in November 2013,has created a huge market for food delivery in China.After years of development,China’s online food delivery market reached RMB 664.62 billion in 2020.In 2022,Meituan Waimai and Ele.me,two food delivery platforms,have created a duopoly in China’s food delivery industry.Due to the success of the food delivery industry,a significant amount of food delivery packaging waste has caused far-reaching harm.This literature review primarily organizes the research on the impact of online food delivery packaging from the perspective of environmental protection.It uses the criterion layer index of online food delivery waste management ecosystem to analyze the impact of the government,environmental non-governmental organizations(NGOs),garbage recycling processors,consumers,online food delivery platforms,takeaway merchants,and takeaway packaging manufacturers.The review shows that scholars generally believe that takeaway waste management is a complex process involving multiple factors.The implementation of policies at the government level is inadequate,and studies at the environmental NGO level are scant.At the consumer level,more environmental awareness education is required.Online food delivery platforms and takeaway merchants should assume greater corporate social responsibility,and manufacturers of takeaway packaging need prioritize the substitution of environmentally friendly materials.There is a consensus that paper-made and recyclable packaging boxes are more environmentally friendly than degradable packaging,which is not as environmentally friendly as is commonly believed.The academia and the industry have conducted various studies and pilot projects on recyclable packaging.If all levels cooperate well,this will be an effective way to manage takeaway packaging garbage.At last,we propose the following assumptions for future research:Besides environmental hazards,takeaway garbage has caused direct or indirect physical harm to humans and animals.Increasing consumer awareness may increase their propensity to participate in governance.Additionally,existing food delivery platforms may need to improve their corporate social responsibility awareness to provide environmentally conscious consumers with sufficient and effective plastic reduction guidance measures during the ordering process.Moreover,will biodegradable plastic products face the same ironic situation as biofuels?That is,the initial intention of technology development is to improve the environment,but the actual process of production or processing may controversially aggravate the environment.

Sodium Content in Takeaway Meals Sampled from Three Large China Cities

Objective: The aim of the present study was to evaluate salt levels in popular hot takeaway meals in three large China cities, and to compare the difference in sodium content in different types of takeaway meals. Methods: We randomly collected a total of 4450 samples of 7 different types of takeaway meals, which were the most consumed by local residents from takeaway platforms. The main ingredients, auxiliary ingredients, as well as the weight used in takeaway meals were collected. The sodium content in takeaway meals was obtained by calculation. Results: Obtained results show that the sodium content in three large China cities is alarmingly high. Comparing medians (interquartile range) of takeaway meals from different cities, Beijing contained the highest sodium content per portion (1371.3 mg (890.3 - 2137.4)), followed by Hangzhou (1348.45 mg (694.25 - 1541.62)) and Shanghai (340.1 (259.75 - 942.25)). In addition, the sodium content between pasta and porridge, Chinese meals, and western meals show significant differences (p 0.05). Compared with Chinese Dietary Reference Intakes, the average sodium content exceeded dietary recommendations for one takeaway meal. The sodium content differed among takeaway meals prepared with various cooking methods and meats. Conclusion: Notable differences are detected in takeaway meals’ sodium content between several large cities in China. To meet China’s target salt intake, consumers in these cities are highly recommended to reduce sodium content in their everyday meals.

Research on Delivery Order Scheduling and Delivery Algorithms

Online takeout has become the dining style of most urban residents.With the development of takeout industry,takeout delivery efficiency and cus-tomer satisfaction have attracted more and more attention from the industry and academia.The essence of takeout delivery problem is a vehicle routing problem under various constraints.Designing reasonable order dispatching and routing algorithms will help to improve the delivery efficiency and service quality for takeout platform.Firstly,by analyzing the order dispatching and delivery problem itself,we summarize the characteristics of the problem,compare the theoretical research of related problems,and describe it as a problem with the characteristics of soft time window,vehicle capacity limitation,dynamic order and 1–1 pick-up and delivery.Secondly,the problem scenario is described in detail,and the main elements and constraints of the problem are explained.Based on this,aiming at minimizing the overdue time,we divide the problem into two subtasks:order dispatching and routing,and propose an order dispatching strategy considering couriers’route and a two-stage routing algorithm.Specifically,this paper improves the calculation the cost in the previous heuristic algorithm based on the cost,that is,when dispatching an order,we consider whether there are orders close enough to the source location or destination location of the new order in every courier’s route,and if so,he can pickup and delivery the new order incidentally.In addition,it is also necessary to punish the courier who have long routes and whose orders have large overdue time;When planning the path for each order,wefirstly apply the nearest neighbor greedy algorithm for initial routing,which means iterativelyfind the time-consuming nearest feasible node in the remaining unplanned nodes,and then apply the tabu search algorithm to optimize the initial path.Finally,the static scenario and dynamic scenario are designed to verify the above algorithm.The static problem scenario solution verifies the effectiveness of the two-stage routing algorithm.The dynamic problem scenario proves the effectiveness of the order dispatching strategy considering couriers’route.We also analyze the ratio of the number of orders and couriers’influence on the performance of the algorithm,and recommend the quantity of couriers under the demand of orders with specific quantity.The experimental results can provide suggestions for the management of courier under the background of epidemic prevention measures such as closing-down due to the COVID-19.In addition,we propose that in a specific scenario,the order re-dispatching can make great improvement at small cost of computing resources.