Evocco is a web-based smart shopping assistant that empowers consumers to buy more eco-friendly food products. It gathers data about the environmental impact of food, and this data can be provided to food retailers and producers. Evoccco rates products according to factors such as greenhouse gas emissions, habitat loss, water usage, and deforestation.
When it comes to helping users find the most nutritious food for the lowest environmental impact, Evocco’s Smart Shopping Assistant is designed to help people adopt a healthy, climate resilient diet. When you go shopping, all you need to do is snap your receipt, build a basket, and track your progress over time to increasingly discover how easy it is to match your beliefs with what you buy. It provides all the tips and tricks needed to train your inner eco-warrior and embrace a more holistically sustainable lifestyle.
The product is aimed at the millennial generation, to educate shoppers about the connection between food and the climate, assisting them to transition to a resilient diet over time. The shopping experience is gamified, and shoppers can track their progress against their peer group.
The user experience is designed with nudge psychology and progressive learning techniques to make the shopping experience easier, and motivate shoppers to continually reduce their impact. The schools of psychology in UCD and the University of Bern are assisting Evocco with this process. Evocco also worked with life cycle assessment data scientists Quantis, and food sustainability experts Eaternity to gather data about what constitutes a healthy, climate resilient diet. This includes water usage, deforestation, biodiversity loss, and emissions associated with a food, as well as how the food ranks on the nutritional density per climate impact index, and against global burden of disease data.
The first version was a plug-in for existing e-commerce sites, with later versions projected to run independently online. They also intend to launch an ethical cryptocurrency, with reward systems for shoppers who switch to lower impact products. These rewards could then be exchanged for goods or services with other environmentally friendly partner companies within the ecosystem.
Where is EVOCCO now?
In 2018, Evocco was little more than a powerful concept; but by the end of the Challenge development programme, the team was able to unveil the first high fidelity prototype of their product. Since then they have focused on user testing and networking, making connections with key industry players (like Nestlé and Unilever) and raising funds through prizes and investors. EVOCCO’s Hugh Weldon even went on to win the UN Young Champion of the Earth prize, winning $15000 to help develop the project, alongside a mentorship and technical support.
Next, the team is working on expanding Offset: a fresh new feature that allows you to plant native, biodiverse woodland to make your shopping carbon neutral. Want to give it a try? Available for free on iOS and Android devices, the app has been downloaded more than 1,000 times since its launch at the end of last year— and the team intends to have 50,000 monthly active users on the app by 2022.
Check out the system for yourself – upload a snapshot of your receipt and see how your everyday shop impacts the world! https://www.evocco.com/
IMPACT & DEVELOPMENT
Evocco works with Go Carbon Neutral to offset emissions for its users.
50,000 monthly active users on the app are expected by 2021.
Their team has grown from two to five members since the start of the Challenge programme.
Evocco has built strong partnerships with decision-makers such as Entrerprise Ireland, Nestlé and Unilever.
Evocco has raised over 221,000 EUR since the start of the Challenge programme.