Food waste, does it matter?

[Balmoral Green]

I see that once again, folks are making a fuss about food waste, fuelled by the media.

Does it really matter?

Once the food has been purchased, whether you eat it or not is irrelevant, as the economic cycle is complete, and that's good for the food industry, business, and the economy as a whole.

If it gets eaten, and then passed as waste down the toilet, fine. If it gets thrown away as waste instead, so what? What's the difference?

I reckon there are still too many people with hang ups about waste, no doubt as a result of rationing and so on during and after the war, and a culture that waste is bad.

Why?

So, if we did get control of food waste, well done. We're going to put producers out of business, and reduce turnover and revenues, and the tax take etc too.

How on earth is this good? Other than a good way to screw the economy and the food industry.

I say buy, and consume or chuck it, so what? It's the buying that matters, not whether you actually eat it or not.

[jas xjr]

Prompted by the supermarket thread , I am more mean than green. I just hate waste.
Even though the press are talking about millions of tons of food waste it would be negligible as far as the manufacturers are concerned.

[mattley]

I think just wasting anything is poor form, and it certainly isn't the end of the economic cycle as disposal isn't free. I suppose if all food waste was composted and used locally that would be OK but the safe disposal of food waste is expensive

[stackmonkey]

I think it's a matter of scale.
There's always a certain amount of food wasted during the prep and cooking and food, and much of that is inevitable and as such, is not a problem.

The problem is when people buy/cook much more food than they need and it ends up going off before it gets eaten and has to be thrown and I really object to that kind of food waste.

[Tango13]

If you saw how much food is wasted between growing and it getting it on the shelves you'd be shocked.

Ever buy half a cucumber? You actually get just over half, this means the offcut goes in the bin as it's too light to be sold, the supermarkets are too strict about what each portion must weigh. The number of bell peppers that get binned due to being the wrong shape is obscene, again the supermarkets dictating what they must look like.

[ClassicMercs]

Food isn't just food - its packing (lots of it), its distribution, its energy for production. So you are wasting more than just the basic foodstuff - eg bread = wheat.
Yes - you might reduce turnover etc of the producers, supermarkets (a good thing to clip their wings a bit) etc. But, if food isn't bought and wasted the customers saved income could then be ploughed into purchasing something else - this generating wealth elsewhere, possibly with lower waste implications.
But the waste doesn't stop at the consumer end - how much do supermarkets throw away due to dates etc ? Quite a lot, even after the end of day markdowns for canny shoppers (right time / right place - although I have seen bust ups before between bargain hunters). Also the manufacturers have waste - excess production to meet 'potential demand' - another source of bargains through the factory shops if you know the right people. Some stuff is free if its not popular - I've recently had some great veg chilli's !
Finally, what about waste at the sharp end. Do you know how much of this years pea harvest is being ploughed back in because of the bumper crop - we are not set up to deal with this situation - just as we have limited plans to deal with the reverse position.

[Mobile Chicane]

ClassicMercs said:

Finally, what about waste at the sharp end. Do you know how much of this years pea harvest is being ploughed back in because of the bumper crop - we are not set up to deal with this situation - just as we have limited plans to deal with the reverse position.

Blimey - yet shell-on peas are £3.99/Kg in Waitrose.

One wonders how much of produce gluts is 'deliberately' wasted, in order to keep prices to the end consumer artificially high. Or could it be that due to the cost of fuel, etc it would actually cost the farmer more to harvest and process the crop than they'd be able to sell it for?

Personally, I abhor waste. Probably since both my parents were refugees from WW2 and literally starved - it was drummed into me as a child that to waste food was a sin.

Nowadays it's less about the moral angle, and more about a personal economic one: not having regular employment and more or less living on savings, I therefore can't afford to waste anything.

[Simpo Two]

Balmoral Green said:

Once the food has been purchased, whether you eat it or not is irrelevant, as the economic cycle is complete, and that's good for the food industry, business, and the economy as a whole.

If it gets eaten, and then passed as waste down the toilet, fine. If it gets thrown away as waste instead, so what? What's the difference?

First, you're wasting money that you could spend on other things like holidays, toys or your old age/pension etc. Add up what you waste each year and do the maths. (Why buy stuff you don't eat? Greed or miscalculation?)

Secondly, if agriculture has to produce 30% food than needed, just because people go 'Wow look it's on offer, I'll get five' then that's 30% more land under the plough that could be left natural or used for something else.

[Bob the Planner]

stackmonkey said:

...
The problem is when people buy/cook much more food than they need and it ends up

...
getting eaten.

I do end up throwing some stuff away but not much. Most (98%) of the food we buy gets eaten in our house and most of the stuff that get thrown away is when half gets used and the remainder put in the fridge for another portion which doesn't get cooked.

[Xaero]

Balmoral Green said:

If it gets eaten, and then passed as waste down the toilet, fine. If it gets thrown away as waste instead, so what? What's the difference?

The difference is one is powering the body and giving you nutrients to live. One is doing absolutely nothing but consuming energy/water in production, cooking and disposal.

Why do this when its so easily avoided?

[Simpo Two]

Xaero said:

One is doing absolutely nothing but consuming energy/water in production, cooking and disposal.

Not so long ago food waste was composted, dug into the garden and so recycled to support the next crop. It was the natural, obvious thing to do.

I'm no greenie but I do find it odd that so much packaging is used - which is annoying when the Co-Op insists on charging you for carrier bags to 'save the planet', yet happily stocks all the over-packaged products...

[tontoro]

http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm

[Balmoral Green]

tontoro said:

http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm

Not really. The baker still has his suit, and the tailor still has his customer. The window is paid for out of insurance, and the insurance company is not out of pocket really, it is their business afterall.

What would put the baker out of business is folks not buying as much of his bread, to avoid wasting it if it goes stale before they use it. When really, does it matter if a little stale bread gets unused?

Folks are talking about reducing food waste by as much as 30%, but how is that different to reducing food sales by 30%, which would not be thought of as a good thing surely? Supermarket or small retailer, I wouldn't like a 30% drop in takings because people were forced to be thrifty, when they don't need to be. It's not as if there's a war on.

Our whole economy is based on buying stuff we don't need. Many would say our cars are wasteful as we don't need them, a car should be for getting from A to B as economically as possible, not for fun. so are we going to let them take them away from us?

The contents of my larder, and what I do with my food is none of anyones business, no more so than the contents of my garage and my petrol tank.

Just more control freakery and the nanny State. So what if I don't eat the second packet of a BOGOF? Mind your own bloody business!

Edited by Balmoral Green on Friday 16th September 11:17

[tontoro]

think of it this way then.

less waste = less demand = less price

waste less and food prices go down

[grumbledoak]

Not really. There is waste at every stage for various reasons, most of it well beyond the power of the consumer. But if it goes into landfill it'll compost; you've wasted some money but what's the alternative - eat rotten food or make yourself obese just for the sake of it? Hardly great ideas.

[tontoro]

grumbledoak said:

what's the alternative - eat rotten food or make yourself obese just for the sake of it? Hardly great ideas.

the alternative is for people to regain their "common" sense and learn how to tell if food has gone off by themselves, without resorting to the labels.

I have a pot of double cream in my fridge which "went off" two weeks ago. I used it last night and it is still absolutely fine. If I had gone by the use by date I would have thrown it out and bought a new one. No becoming obese or eating rotten food involved.

the comparison with the broken window fallacy is a valid one, as if you do not spend your money on the food you will spend it elsewhere in the economy, so whilst the food producers may find their sales go down, other people will have their sales increased by an equivalent amount

[marshalla]

Balmoral Green said:

Not really. The baker still has his suit, and the tailor still has his customer. The window is paid for out of insurance, and the insurance company is not out of pocket really, it is their business afterall.

But everyone who takes out an insurance policy is a little worse off, because the risk has increased and the premiums have gone up to cover that and the extra loss incurred - so the loss has been spread around, not disappeared. So everyone spends a little less to make up for it.

[mph1977]

controlling waste as one of the other posters has said is as much about 'mean ' as it is about 'green '

why (any combination of ) purchase, transport, store, prep, serve and then waste food ...

I don't know if anyone saw the short series of Documentaries James Martin recently did for the BBC about transforming hospital food at Scarborough Hospital - the level of waste from the wards was huge - there are various factors that mitigate against this but a lot of them are things that could be changed , especially if you are as lucky as Scarborough is to still retain a proper on site kitchen rather than an industrial cook-chill Plant or as seen with some of the PFI builds a combination of brought in cook-chill and frozen with the distributed 'kitchens' not really able to produce any meaningful food.

That said moving to the mixed frozen and cook chill menu has actually improved the food where i work as some stuff like veg now comes frozen + raw rather than prepped from fresh or tinned and heated twice- and only gets cooked once - the 'regeneration' cycle immediately prior to the trolley going out to the ward - and the frozen ready made thick soups are considerably better than the glorified cup-a-soups that we had before ) - and the kitchen facilities that are in place struggling to keep up demand for the limited range of cooked to order food for the restaurant / specialist requests and putting together salads etc for the wards ( as sandwiches etc are brought in )

[Simpo Two]

tontoro said:

think of it this way then.

less waste = less demand = less price

waste less and food prices go down

Not following that. If we all bought 10% less the shops would raise prices to retain margin.

[tontoro]

Simpo Two said:

tontoro said:

think of it this way then.

less waste = less demand = less price

waste less and food prices go down

Not following that. If we all bought 10% less the shops would raise prices to retain margin.

so when an item becomes unpopular and shops have too much of it, do you think they raise or lower the price?