Food Waste Is Becoming Serious Economic and Environmental Issue, Report Says

[Bill USA]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/us/food-waste-is-becoming-serious-economic-and-environmental-issue-report-says.html?ref=topics

WASHINGTON — With millions of households across the country struggling to have enough to eat, and millions of tons of food being tossed in the garbage, food waste is increasingly being seen as a serious environmental and economic issue.

A report released Wednesday shows that about 60 million metric tons of food is wasted a year in the United States, with an estimated value of $162 billion. About 32 million metric tons of it end up in municipal landfills, at a cost of about $1.5 billion a year to local governments.

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The report estimates that a third of all the food produced in the world is never consumed, and the total cost of that food waste could be as high as $400 billion a year. Reducing food waste from 20 to 50 percent globally could save $120 billion to $300 billion a year by 2030, the report found.

“Food waste is a global issue, and tackling it is a priority,” said Richard Swannell, director of sustainable food systems at the Waste and Resources Action Program, or Wrap, an antiwaste organization in Britain that compiled the new report. “The difficulty is often in knowing where to start and how to make the biggest economic and environmental savings.”
(more)

Food Waste Is Costing Countries Billions Every Year And Contributing To Climate Change - Think Progress
(emphases my own)

Food waste is costing the global economy billions each year, and governments should act quickly to reduce it if they want to save money and scale back their carbon emissions, according to a new report.

The report, published this week by the U.K.-based Waste & Resources Action Program (WRAP), found that if countries made a point of reducing their food waste, the globe could save a total of $120 to $300 billion each year by 2030. Globally, the report states, a third of all food is wasted, an amount that totals $400 billion each year. And that value will only go up, the report warns — if estimates that the world’s middle class will double by 2030 pan out, the yearly value of food waste could increase to $600 billion.

That’s bad news for the environment. In its report, WRAP looked at the greenhouse gas emissions associated with food waste in the U.K., and found that each metric ton of food that’s wasted in the U.K. is associated with 4.0 to 4.6 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e). Previous reports have also found food waste to be a significant factor in global greenhouse gas emissions: in 2013, a report by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization found that, if global food waste was a country, it would be the third largest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions in the world.

“Reducing food waste is good for the economy and good for the climate,” Helen Mountford, Global Program Director for the New Climate Economy, said in a statement for WRAP. “These findings should serve as a wake-up call to policymakers around the world.”
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[jtuck004]

1. I wonder how quick that would end if we stopped subsidizing sugar and other large, harmful

producers at the expense of the health of the consumers who are paying for it?

Then lettuce and other veggies would begin to show parity, and there might well be less waste.

[Bill USA]

3. protectionist sugar policies (for around 3,500 growers) costs consumers $2.9 - $3.5 billion/ year

http://www.economics21.org/commentary/sugar-subsidies-are-bitter-deal-american-consumers

The government also enforces a system of tariffs and quotas on imported sugar, limiting the supply of cheaper sugar that can be imported from abroad. This results in wide spreads between global and domestic sugar prices. In the absence of protection, consumers and sugar-using producers alike could save several cents a pound on sugar bought from other countries.

Such savings would have positive consequences for America’s growth. An Iowa State University study by John Beghin and Amani Elobeid concluded that if the sugar program were abolished, U.S. sugar prices would fall by roughly a third, saving consumers $2.9 billion to $3.5 billion.

The study also found that employment in industries that depend on sugar as an input, such as confectioners, would add 17,000 to 20,000 new jobs in the absence of the sugar program. Already, confectioners are moving production abroad to take advantage of lower foreign sugar prices. Eliminating the sugar program could reverse this trend.

Surprisingly, repealing the sugar program would increase employment in the sugar industry itself. In absence of federal meddling, American sugar refineries would be able to use cheap sugar from abroad rather than expensive, protected domestic sugar for their operations. The Iowa State University study estimates that domestic sugar refineries would expand output by 24 percent in the absence of the sugar program.

.. that's not all. these growers import labor from around the Carribean(sp?) employing near slave labor practices. This applies to sugar growers outside U.S. as well..http://www.foodispower.org/importing-slavery/

[RiverLover]

2. Just Eat It: A Food Waste Story (Trailer @ CPH:DOX 2014)

http://www.foodwastemovie.com/