Benefits of Reducing Global Food Waste
29th November 2016
This report highlights the need for action on food waste and provides concrete examples of how this can be achieved.
Key points
Reducing global consumer food waste could save US$120-300 billion per year by 2030. To achieve this would require a 20-50% reduction in consumer food waste
One third of all food produced in the world ends up as waste, while the value of global consumer food waste is more than US$400 billion per year
As the global middle class expands over the course of the decade, the cost could rise to US$600 billion, according to the new research
7% of all global greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), 3.3 billion tonnes CO2 equivalent (CO2eq) per year, are due to food waste
Overview
Overview
The value of the global food and agriculture sector is around US$8 trillion, or 10% of global GDP, and it provides employment to over a billion people, or a third of the world’s workforce (ILO 2014). The production and consumption of food demands huge resources, in terms of raw materials and the land required to produce these, and the energy, capital, labour required for growing, manufacturing, packaging, storing, transporting and cooking around 4 billion tonnes of food for 7 billion people. Technological advances and cultural/societal shifts have brought huge changes to both the industry and food consumption, and the rate of change is accelerating.
However, major adjustments are required to the food system in order to provide sufficient, healthy food for a growing and developing world population, to ensure international and national food supply chains are secure and to reduce environmental impact (including climate change mitigation and the protection of biodiversity). Solutions include increasing production (sustainable intensification), making production and products more sustainable (reducing impacts across a range of metrics, more sustainable sourcing and so on) and reducing the impact of food consumption (including the amounts and types of food eaten, and methods of food storage and preparation).
Reducing food waste is an important and achievable approach to making both food production and consumption more sustainable as well as delivering significant economic benefits. WRAPs work on ‘Securing the Future’ illustrated how reducing food waste could make substantial contributions to reducing the impact of food (WRAP 2010). Recent work by the World Resources Institute (WRI 2013a,b) and Ray et al (2013) has again highlighted the need to develop a ‘menu of solutions’ to achieve a sustainable food system that include reducing the amounts of food wasted.
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Contents
Contents
Summary >>
Introduction >>
Why preventing food waste must be the priority >>
Food waste globally – a brief overview >>
UK experience – establishing a robust evidence base >>
UK experience - strategies to reduce food waste >>
How reducing food waste delivers economic benefits and contributes to lower GHG emissions >>
How targeting interventions can maximise reductions in GHG emissions >>
Examples of potential impacts from food waste reduction >>
What can governments and other senior influencers do to reduce food waste? >>
Conclusion >>
References >>
Annex – Illustration of the ‘food loop’ in the UK >>
Conclusions
Conclusions
Key recommendations:
In addition to the points above, several very practical short term recommendations can be made:
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Related
Related
To find information related to this guide, please use the following links:
Courtauld Commitment 2025 >>
Global food waste reduction >>
Hospitality and food service agreements >>
Overview of Waste in the UK Hospitality and Food Service Sector >>
Household food waste collections guide >>
Green and garden waste >>