The Economics of Food Waste

There was a terrific programme on the economics of food waste on BBC Radio 4’s Food Programme this lunchtime. “The Food Programme investigates the food waste created by restaurants, food manufacturers, supermarkets and airline caterers.” Details of the programme are available here.

If we believe them, the scale of the mountain of uneaten food is vast and a stunning waste of scarce economic resources. Food waste comes from household bins, supermarkets, pubs, restaurants, airline caterers and other commercial food producers. From printing errors on packaging to errors on sell by dates, from food that is delayed in transit for just a few days to the dumping of wasted products from supermarkets that have failed to meet their sales targets, we are serial disposers of millions of tonnes of food waste. How can we move towards a more sustainable future for our food industry? The methane gas from food waste accumulating in landfill sites is a significant and growing contributor to global warming. The programme offers rays of hope - there is money to be made from kitchen scraps that can be collected and converted into electricity and compost - but the scale of this is minute at present. A cultural change is needed - not least a change of behaviour by consumers and a move away from knee-jerk marketing from food retailers which take them away from longer term planning about how much food they need.

Growing food waste mountain blamed on get-one-free offers