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Our food wastage is too high

Published : Saturday, 31 August, 2024 at 12:00 AM  Count : 1742
MS Siddiqui
According to the World Food Program (WFP), worldwide,811 million people pass their night with empty stomachs due to lack of food. According to the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), the world's 877 million hungry people could be fed, with a third of the food wasted or thrown away each year.

As per the World Food Program's (WFP) Food Security Monitoring 2023 report, 36% of the total population of Bangladesh is still suffering from food insecurity as poverty and malnutrition continue to coexist. The Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) reported that 21.91% of the population are experiencing moderate or severe food insecurity while 0.83% are suffering from severe food insecurity. 

The UN Environment Program's Food Waste Index Report, published on 27 March 2024, tracks the progress of countries to halve food waste by 2030.An estimated 82kg of food is wasted annually by Bangladeshis, a significantly higher amount compared to prosperous nations like the USA, Russia, and China. The report is co-authored by UNEP and Waste and Resources Action Program (WRAP), an international charity.The world wasted an estimated 19% of the food produced globally in 2022, or about 1.05 billion tonnes resulted in 783 million people face chronic hunger. According to a report by The Guardian, food wastage will reach 2.1 billion tonnes globally by 2030, meaning we will wasting 66 tonnes of food per second.
Researchers analyzed country data on households, food service and retailers. They found that each person wastes about 79 kilograms of food annually, equal to at least 1 billion meals wasted worldwide daily.

Apart from hunger, food waste is also a global concern because of the environmental toll of production, including the land and water required to raise crops and animals and the greenhouse gas emissions it produces, including methane, a powerful gas that has accounted for about 30 percent of global warming since pre-industrial times.Food loss and waste generates 8 to 10 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Most of the waste - 60% - came from the households. About 28% came from food service, or restaurants, with about 12% from retailers.The food discarded per capita in homes was 74kg on average across the world, where households in lower middle-income countries wasted 91kg, upper middle-income countries wasted 76kg and high-income countries wasted 79kg per person each year.

The report showed notable growth in coverage of food waste in low- and middle-income countries and the differences in per capita household food waste between high-income, upper middle and lower-income countries were surprisingly small. 

A Bangladeshi wastes 65kg of food each year on an average, which is much higher than what a person wastes in such rich countries as Russia (33kg), the United States of America (59kg) and Ireland (55kg), a UN report has revealed.

In the UNEP report, 'food waste' is defined as food and the associated inedible parts removed from the human food supply chain while 'food' is defined as any substance - whether processed, semi-processed or raw - that is intended for human consumption. 

Every year 10.62 million tonnes of food are wasted by households in Bangladesh, according to the report.Bangladesh is now importing about 2 million tonnes of rice and wheat.  Bangladesh is the third-largest importer of food globally. Bangladesh can become food surplus country with efficiently reduce the food waste.

A significant portion of waste ranging from 68.3% to 81.1% of the overall municipal solid waste (MSW) in the country is food. The generation of food waste in Bangladesh is primarily attributed to various sources such as restaurants, agricultural activities, household disposal, and social gatherings.

People become conscious and the UN Environment Program's Food Waste Index Report report2024 said many governments, regional and industry groups are using public-private partnerships to reduce food waste and its contributions to climate and water stress. Governments and municipalities collaborate with businesses in the food supply chain, whereby businesses commit to measure food waste.

The report said food redistribution - including donating surplus food to food banks and charities - is significant in tackling food waste among retailers.

One group doing that is Food Banking Kenya, a nonprofit that gets surplus food from farms, markets, supermarkets and packing houses and redistributes it to schoolchildren and vulnerable populations. Food waste is an increasing concern in Kenya, where an estimated 4.45 million tons of food is wasted every year.

"The key takeaway is that reducing the amount of food that is wasted is an avenue that can lead to many desirable outcomes - resource conservation, fewer environmental damages, greater food security, and more land for uses other than as landfills and food production," said an expert.

If we want to get serious about tackling climate change, nature and biodiversity loss, and pollution and waste, businesses, governments and citizens around the world have to do their part to reduce food waste. Reducing food waste would cut greenhouse gas emissions, slow the destruction of nature through land conversion and pollution, enhance the availability of food and thus reduce hunger and save money at a time of global recession. 

One avenue for improvement lies in reevaluating and modernising the traditional distribution system. By leveraging technology and data-driven insights, we can explore various approaches to streamline the agricultural supply system from producers to consumers. This could involve minimising intermediaries, optimising transportation routes, improving storage facilities, and enhancing overall efficiency. Government many invest for improvement of the supply system. 

An education campaigns must be launched at all levels to instill awareness about the consequences of food waste and promote responsible consumption practices.

Governments may consider enacting and enforce laws and policyto prevent food waste and food conservation. Collaborations between stakeholders including governments, NGOs, and businesses are vital to implement efficient food distribution systems that redirect surplus food to those in need.

In some countries, authority may consider to use ICT technology / software base app for posting inputs of accesses food from the hotels, social gathering for information of organized distribution system to deliver the extra foods to the really needy poor people. 

Moreover, consumers play a pivotal role in this equation. By making informed choices, reducing food waste at the individual level, and supporting initiatives that prioritise efficiency and sustainability, every citizen can contribute to creating a more resilient food system.

The writer is former Non-Government Adviser, Bangladesh Competition Commission, Legal Economist & CEO, Bangla Chemical



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