Study: America wastes $160 billion in food every year
Food label guides or initiatives like the removal of sell-by dates could help reduce food label confusion and alleviate the perceived tradeoff between food waste and foodborne illness.
Nearly 70% of respondents agree that throwing away food after the package date has passed reduces the odds of foodborne illness, according to a study produced by SQL Server Reporting Services, a server-based report generating software system from Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Wash.
About one-third of the world’s edible food is lost or wasted annually, while the challenge to feed the projected world population of 9.3 billion people by the mid-century will require 60% more food than is currently produced. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, Washington, D.C., identified reducing food waste as an avenue to increase the availability of food, while the Obama administration announced in September of 2015 a first ever food waste reduction goal for the United States of 50% by 2030. While present in the entire post-harvest supply chain, food waste at the retail and consumer levels is particularly prevalent in the United States. In 2010, 133 billion pounds of edible food at the retail and consumer levels went uneaten (1,249 calories per person per day) with about two-thirds of this waste attributed to consumers. This represents not only a significant waste of resources, but also substantial negative environmental externalities, as 95% of food waste enters U.S. landfills.