Food Waste: The Extent of the Problem; Your Role in the Solution

Are you tired of being scolded by the government and the news media for wasting food?  Well, don't just sulk or become belligerent; do something about it.  No, I'm not recommending that you eat the household garbage.  (Then you'd be accused of adding to the obesity crisis.)  There are better ways to deal with the problem, such as not buying more food than you can use, freezing leftovers or making another meal incorporating them, composting, and so on.  Let's find out just how much food waste there is, why wasted food is a problem, and what can be done to solve the problem. Are use-by dates partly to blame?  Let's check out that possibility, too. 

The Extent of Food Waste in the U.S.

It's so incredible that it's difficult to believe.  We waste about 40% of all edible food.  Of course, American households are not to blame for all of this.  Losses occur all along the food chain--from where food is grown and processed, to businesses that store and/or transport food, to restaurants (Are portions too large?) and other facilities that serve food.  But a significant amount of waste is caused by consumers in their homes. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, the typical American throws out 40% of fresh fish, 23% of eggs, and 20 % of milk, in addition to 15-20% of produce.  Each month, the average American throws away between $28-$43 of food, about 20 lbs. of food. The three main reasons for all this waste, says the NRDC, are over-purchasing, food spoilage, and plate waste.  The biggest wasters: households of only one person and households with children.

Here's what the USDA reported in February, 2014: "In the United States, 31 percent--or 133 billion pounds--of the 430 billion pounds of the available food supply at the retail and consumer levels in 2010 went uneaten."  The estimated total value of this food was $161.6 billion.

Why Food Waste Is a Serious Problem

When we waste food (and who doesn't?), that leaves us with less money to spend on other things we need or want. Of course, we can't help a certain amount of food waste. Sometimes our kids are picky eaters. Sometimes the strawberries get moldy faster than we expect. And, when we cook for guests, we want to be sure we make enough, so we usually prepare too much. But waste by individuals has some widespread, significant bad effects.  Here are some of the most important of these mentioned by the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency).

We're creating too much dangerous methane gas: According to the EPA, more food winds up in landfills and incinerators than any other single material in municipal solid waste.  In 2012, that amounted to 36 tons of food waste. 

Food put into landfills rots and turns into a major source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that has 21 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide.  Landfills account for more than 20% of all methane emissions in the U.S.

We're wasting resources to create some food we eventually discard: Many resources are needed to grow food; these include water, fertilizers, pesticides, and energy.  When we waste foods, we're also wasting the resources needed to create that food. The EPA says that about 13% of greenhouse gases created in the US. are the result of growing, manufacturing, transporting, and disposing of food. Reducing food waste would also reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Note these startling statistics:

• Feeding the U.S. population uses 50% of the country's land.
• The US. spends about 1 billion dollars per year to dispose of food waste.

We're wasting food that some people need: The EPA reports that an estimated 50 million Americans don't have access to enough food.  "Feed people, not landfills," the government urges.  And don't forget that food waste and food shortage are also global problems. The world faces an ever-greater challenge of feeding a rapidly expanding population. Global solutions will require discovering new ways to grow and distribute healthful food to areas where people are inadequately fed.  The NRDC says, "Feeding the planet will only become more difficult with 9-10 billion people expected on the planet in 2050."

How Food Waste Can Be Reduced

What consumers can do:

Here are some suggestions from the NRDC, from Good Housekeeping magazine, and from other Shelf Life Advice articles.

• Be a smart shopper.  Go to the store with a grocery list, and stick to it.  Don't buy large quantities of perishable food just because the bigger package has a lower price per pound.  If you can't use food or freeze it, it's likely to wind up in a landfill.
• Don't use sell-by dates or use-by dates to decide on when to discard food.  Sell-by dates are primarily for stores to determine when food should be taken off the shelves; they are not indicators of spoilage.  Use-by dates tell consumers when a product is no longer at peak quality, NOT that it's spoiled or contaminated.  To read more about this point, go to "It Says 'Use By Tomorrow,' But You Don't Have To."
• Keep track of what's in your fridge, so you can use foods before they become garbage.  Put foods that are approaching those use-by dates near the front of your fridge or cabinet.  Write them into your weekly meal plans.
• Leftovers should be served or frozen (if possible). 
• In a restaurant, consider these alternatives:

1) ask for smaller portions

2) order fewer courses

3) take home what you can't eat, and remember to use it within a day or two. 

• At home, serve less (or serve buffet style) and offer more after diners have finished initial portions.
• Compost food scraps to reduce their impact upon the climate and recycle their nutrients.  Good Housekeeping suggests setting up a compost bin for fruit and vegetable peelings.  Furthermore, the magazine recommends a kitchen composter (bokashi bin) for cooked waste. "Just feed it with your scraps (you can even put fish and meat in it), sprinkle over a layer of special microbes and leave to ferment. The resulting product can be used on houseplants and in the garden." 
• Got a lot of leftovers from a party?  Invite some neighbors to take some food home or to join you for dinner at your house. 
• Be creative when perishables begin to spoil.  My mother-in-law used to turn her getting-soft bananas into banana cake.  Even easier, toss fruit that's getting mushy into the blender and make a smoothie.
• Donate nonperishable and unspoiled perishable food to a local food bank, soup kitchen, pantry, or shelter.  Note: some of these places will not accept food with expired use-by dates, so try to pass on food you don't want before it is past the stamped date.

We can't get rid of all food waste.  We'll probably continue to discard the extra milk in the bowl after all the cereal in it has been eaten. But Olive Garden restaurants can discontinue its practice of serving unlimited breadsticks, many of which remain uneaten. At home, we can certainly do a better job of saving or recycling food than we're doing now.

What science and industry can do:

The hope is that science and industry will help by turning significant amounts of food waste into renewable energy.  One company that's working on this is the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in Brooklyn. Its goal is to transform organic waste from houses and apartments into clean energy.  With the help of trillions of bacteria, the plan is to convert methane gas from food scraps into energy that could provide electricity or heat for people's residences. The Newton Creek plant's process of turning food waste into energy is called anaerobic digestion.  This is an idea that's in its infancy but is catching on.  To read more about this, go to "Turning Food Waste Into Fuel Takes Gumption and Trillions of Bacteria."

Two other good industrial uses of food waste are feeding animals (such as those on pig farms) and turning fats, oil, and grease into products or biofuel.

Additional Comments on Use-By Dates

According to the IFT (Institute of Food Technologists), the terminology used with the dates on foods creates a great deal of confusion. Here's a quote from a recent live IFT session: "Consumers don’t differentiate between 'use by,' 'sell by,' or 'best before.' To consumers, the terms are all the same, and they thus discard products according to the calendar date stamped on food products.  Approximately 30% of consumers discard food past the 'sell by' date,...and more than 30% of them discard food past the 'use by' date. Moreover, up to 15% of consumers believe they could incur a serious health risk by eating food past the 'sell by,' 'use by,' or 'best before' dates."

Shelf Life Advice has discussed the confusion about sell-by and use-by dates in these articles:

Use-by dates under attack!  Can they be defended or improved?

Do Food Product Dates Make Consumers Safer or Just Poorer?

There is no doubt that use-by dates (which are helpful to consumers in some ways) cause some people to throw out perfectly good food because they erroneously fear it's contaminated.  The news media are trying to educate consumers, and so is Shelf Life Advice. The two articles listed above clear up many areas of confusion. When in doubt about whether to serve some food or throw it out, use the search box on the  Shelf Life Advice home page or go to the product Q/As to find shelf life information.

Source(s):

nrdc.org "Your Scraps Add Up: Reducing food waste can save money and resources"

http://www.nrdc.org/living/eatingwell/files/foodwaste_2pgr.pdf

epa.gov "Reducing Food Waste for Business"

http://www.epa.gov/foodrecovery/

npr.org/blogs/the salt "Turning Food Waste Into Fuel..." 

http://endhunger.org/food_waste.htm

ift.org "Use By, Sell By, Best By--Let's Call the Whole Thing Off"

http://live.ift.org/2014/06/23/use-by-sell-by-best-by-lets-call-the-whole-thing-off/  

Good Housekeeping, "10 Easy Ways to Reduce Food Waste," June 2014.

usda.gov "The Estimated Amount, Value, and Calories of Postharvest Food Losses at the Retail and Consumer Levels in the United States"

http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-information-bulletin/eib121.aspx - .VBoAU0sVcTs

endhunger.org "Food Waste in America"

http://endhunger.org/food_waste.htm