For my fourth civic issues blog post, I will be discussing food waste, which I’m sure is something we’re all familiar with, since we have all probably gotten too much to eat at the dining hall buffet one time or another. However, there is more that contributes to food waste than you might think of initially.
An Introduction to Food Waste
To understand food waste, we first have to understand food loss, which occurs at farms and in the supply chain. The World Resources Institute identifies two main drivers of food loss: inadequate technology and suboptimal packaging. Inadequate technology includes poor infrastructure, lack of cold storage, and inefficient machinery. Suboptimal packaging includes excessive packaging, which attempts to reduce food spoiling but ultimately provides more waste.
The most common reasons for food waste include poor food management and consumer behaviors. At restaurants, sometimes insufficient cooking skills among the staff can lead to food waste when a dish is made incorrectly. In addition, supply and demand also plays a factor with food retailers, who may think they need a certain supply of a certain food but end up not using or selling all of it. And of course, consumer behaviors refer to how we as citizens waste food inside and outside of our home.
Climate Issues with Food Waste (and Some Potential Solutions)
Project Drawdown identifies reducing food loss and waste as one of the best strategies for fighting the climate crisis and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Approximately 10% of greenhouse gas emissions come from food loss and waste related machinery. More food waste means more food production where the food made did not go eaten, which means wasted greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, when food rots in landfills, methane gas is emitted into the atmosphere, which has 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide, one of the more familiar greenhouse gases. So, if we were to reduce food waste, we would be helping climate change significantly.
One of the ways to reduce food waste is to improve the current food systems to help feed more people since, though there’s much food being wasted, many are still underfed. To do this, however, there would be a need for agricultural expansion, which results in deforestation, ultimately releasing more carbon into the atmosphere. On the flip side, agricultural efficiency could free up land currently used to make food, which could lead to reforestation.
The Effectiveness of Wasting Less Food
We can all do our part to make sure we don’t buy excessive amounts of food at the store or waste unnecessary food at the dining hall. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says that the national food waste reduction goal is to cut food waste by 50% by 2030. If we all do our individual part in the country to reduce food waste, this goal is possible to achieve and will positively impact climate change. Therefore, this a very effective option for the environment due to its many benefits (which can be seen quickly on the local level), and easiness to implement in individual households.
Learn more about how you can reduce food waste at home here.
This blog post definitely brought my attention to an issue that even I am a part of. Food waste is a huge issue, especially on our campus here at Penn State. With the amount of food wasted, specifically, at the dining hall buffets, it is crucial that we as student try to limit that. I do know that there is a program that takes some of the food waste and donates it to local shelters and individuals who may not have food on their plates.
This was a really interesting post! I didn’t realize how much goes into food waste, and how it’s not just tossing out leftover food after dinner. I think decreasing food waste by 50% in the next 6 years is a big goal, but I think we can get close. I will definitely be paying more attention to meal planning and prep now.