The French take their food seriously. And now we know that they don’t look too kindly on it being wasted. In mid-April, a government-appointed committee released a proposal to tackle food waste in France (PDF in French). The Fight Against Food Waste (Lutte Contre Le Gaspillage Alimentaire – #GaspillageAlimentaire) suggests 36 ways to do just [...]
Here’s a roundup of recent wasted food news, from the sublime to the ridiculous. With the former, a UK org called Hubbub is pushing the humble (and potentially artistic) pancake as a way to reduce wasted food. Why pancakes? Because they’re so flippin‘ versatile! On the latter, the notion of ‘raccoon meat’ certainly feels disgusting at [...]
If you’re like me, you love innovations that prevent food from being wasted and hate the inefficiency of expiration dates. That’s why I’m high on Bump Mark, an in-package fresh food indicator now in development. Solveiga Pakstaite, a recent university grad in Britain, created Bump Mark after winning the James Dyson Award to do so. As you [...]
2014 has been a banner year for fighting food waste. There many successes to celebrate, including those on the policy level: Massachusetts’ ban on commercial food waste to landfills went into effect on October 1, The Milan Protocol included a goal of 50 percent reduction in food waste by 2020, and the USDA streamlined procedures for [...]
January 1 is a great day to be a Vancouver trash collector. Starting then, the regular trash will be blessedly free of food waste. A city-wide ban on disposing food in landfills goes into effect in 2015. While the practice will technically be outlawed, Metro Vancouver won’t begin fining anyone for six months, and even [...]
Scary data point of the day: in India, 40 percent of the food by value does not reach consumers. And yes, this is a nation where 47 percent of children are underweight. — — If all eyes are on Boston, they will be so for a while! The (commercial) food waste landfill ban doesn’t kick in until [...]
I may be the last to write about the brilliant Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables campaign from French supermarket chain Intermarché, but I want to say that it’s the best initiative on food waste I’ve seen from one company. Selling ugly (moches) fruits and vegetables at a 30% discount after raising awareness with a line of [...]
Here’s a neat infographic on food waste in Britain, courtesy of Rangemaster. One of the more telling details: 86 million chickens are wasted every year in the UK. What the cluck?! Another effective part of the infographic is the Wembley Stadium indicator. But it’s worth noting: UK food waste would fill that stadium 8 times [...]
Plenty of news from Food Waste World recently: There’s an increased likelihood of the EU banning “best before” labels on shelf-stable foods like grains, canned goods and frozen items. The Dutch and Swedish farming ministers sent a letter recommending that course of action to the EU Agriculture Council, who discussed the issue today (but didn’t [...]
