And you thought September 29 was just National (U.S.) Coffee Day! The UN declared this day to in fact be International Day of Awareness for Food Loss and Waste. Who am I to argue? Instead, I joined the UN FAO’s Twitter chat. While I’d appreciate a shorter acronym next time to alleviate the Twitter character […]
I recently had the opportunity to help lead a Penn course on sustainability and the food-water-energy nexus, with an emphasis on food waste. The bulk of the course consisted of a week-long trip to Italy. Why Italy? First, why ever not? Second, course instructor Steve Finn wanted to explore food waste through the lens of […]
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 […]
