European Food Summit - Stop wasting food!

Stop wasting food!

Sora, 18. 12. 2019

Food is not merely fuel for our bodies, since it also has a strong social significance. 

We socialize over good food, make memories, celebrate anniversaries, blow candles, take new steps, toast to successes and many other things. Therefore, it is even more surprising that a third of the food we produce never even lands on a plate.

Food waste is one of the biggest problems of the modern world. 

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations stated that if food waste was an independent country, it would be the third largest greenhouse gas producer in the world. When calculating the carbon footprint produced in the process of production, processing, storage and transportation of food, wasted food almost equals global road transport emissions.

How is even possible to discuss such large quantities of wasted food? 

We need to look at the whole food supply chain. Wasted food is not only the food discarded by households, but also by retail chains, during transport, in the processing of raw materials, and surely, at the very beginning, by the producers. However, the largest quantity of food is wasted by us, the households, which makes 40% of all food waste.

Another striking fact is that individuals in developed countries on average waste between 95 and 115 kilograms of food per year, while in underdeveloped countries, they waste only 8 to 11 kilograms of food per year.

However, regardless of these enormous amounts of food waste, as many as 975 million people in the world are malnourished and starving, while most of the food we buy at our stores is produced in the very countries where people do not have enough to eat.

The solution? 

It is very simple. DO NOT WASTE FOOD.

Small steps can have the greatest results. Let us learn how to store food properly, let us buy less food and consume what is already in the fridge. At various celebrations, when we always prepare too much food, why not surprise the neighbours with the excess food? You can also take the leftovers to a farm to feed the animals. There are plenty of ways, so start today, not tomorrow.

You take away more, when you throw away less. FOOD for future’s GOOD. 

SOURCE:https://www.eatresponsibly.eu/