Food Waste Backgrounder
Food Waste Backgrounder
What is Food Waste?
Food waste is the discard of edible food at retail or consumer use. Food loss is food that is discarded in the stages between production and distribution. Everyone has a role to play in addressing food loss and waste, including governments, businesses and consumers. This Backgrounder focuses on household food waste and actions that we (as consumers) can take to reduce food waste.
Food Waste and Climate Change
Food waste results in significant environmental, economic and social consequences. The inefficient use of resources produces avoidable pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from production to distribution. Disposal of avoidable food waste at landfills increases waste disposal cost and generates methane emissions, a powerful greenhouse gas.
How Much Food Waste is Generated?
Globally, half of all food produced is not eaten. In Canada, more than one third of food produced is not eaten. Consumers generate 21% (2.3 M tonnes)of the edible food waste.
Some food waste such as egg shells, bones, fruit cores are unavoidable, but a large portion of wasted food is avoidable, including leftovers and untouched food. Recent research conducted by the National Zero Waste Council (NZWC) on Canadian household food waste shows that 2.3 million tonnes of avoidable food is wasted each year, that is equivalent to 6.9 million tonnes of CO2. In addition, avoidable household food waste costs the average Canadian household $1,300 per year.
In Ontario, food and organic wastes make up 31% of all residential waste sent to landfills. Toronto’s single-family households generate more than 99,000 tonnes of food waste (avoidable and unavoidable) per year. The average household throws away 200 kg of food waste per year of which over 50% is avoidable. Fruits and vegetables are the most common wasted edible foods.
Policies and Strategies on Food Waste
In 2015, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 12.3 seeks to reduce per capita global food waste by half at the retail and consumer levels by 2030. Canada committed to this target, and is developing strategies and policies with partners to address food loss and waste from farm to plate. The City of Toronto is addressing food waste through its Long Term Waste Management Strategy. To improve awareness of the causes and solutions to household and consumer food waste, Canadian governments, from local to federal levels, partnered with the NZWC and major retailers on the Love Food Hate Waste (LFHW) Canada campaign to engage consumers. Many useful tips are available on the LFHW website.
Tips to Reduce Household Food Waste
Plan your meals - buy what you need, buy little and often, buy local and in season
Keep it fresh - learn to store or fridge your food properly to keep them fresh
Use it up - understand best before date vs expiry date, learn ways to revive your food, freeze your meat and even many vegetables, cook and freeze, drying and canning food, use leftover recipes, make broth with scraps and bones
Donate excess and good quality food to food programs such as food banks and community fridges to help your community
Compost as a last resort to recycle food waste into compost. Place food waste in green bins or compost at home.
Refrences and resources
A Food Loss and Waste Strategy for Canada, by National Zero Waste Canada
http://www.nzwc.ca/Documents/NZWC-FoodLossWasteStrategy-EN.pdf
The Avoidable Crisis of Food Waste: A Roadmap, by Value Chain Management International Inc. and Second Harvest
This Ontario Food Collaborative site that offers tips on reducing food waste
https://ontariofoodcollaborative.ca/foodwaste/
US EPA offers Tips on Prevention Food Waste at Home
https://www.epa.gov/sustainable-management-food/food-too-good-waste-implementation-guide-and-toolkit
Canadian Food Inspection Agency - Best before vs Expiry dates labels
The Ikea chef team authored a cookbook on reducing kitchen waste
https://www.ikea.com/ca/en/campaigns/scrapsbook-zero-waste-recipes-pub147efb60
A book and website by Anne-Marie Bonneau with tips on a zero waste kitchen
https://ontariofoodcollaborative.ca/foodwaste/
This is a food waste learning hub made from a collaboration of the National Zero Waste Council, Toronto Metropolitan University, the Government of Canada and other organisations. The Ontario Food collaborative offers a great site to gather information on how to store, cook, sort, & plan food.
An article by Conserve Energy Future provides tips to reduce their own food waste at home.
https://www.conserve-energy-future.com/smart-ways-recycle-food-waste.php
The Too Good To Go app allows individuals to save bags of food from retailers that would have been thrown away for a relatively cheap price.
https://www.toogoodtogo.com/en-ca
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/sustainability/food-waste/
The Harvard T.H. CHAN has delivered in-depth articles with references from the United States Department of Agriculture, United States Environmental Protection Agency, and others. The site provides a simplified understanding of waste, its causes, benefits to its reduction, and solutions to help reduce it.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/massively-reducing-food-waste-could-feed-the-world/
An article with Scientific American on how the reduction of food waste is beneficial to global food security, and also linked to issues revolving around climate change such as the packaging around the food.
An article by Project Drawdown on how the reduction of food waste is beneficial to global food security, and also linked to issues revolving around climate change
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/massively-reducing-food-waste-could-feed-the-world/
Where to store your food in the fridge
Click here to learn more: LOVE FOOD HATE WASTE
