Food Waste Intelligence

2015 was the biggest year yet for those of us working on solving the global issue of wasted food. It’s an exciting time to be working on this topic! But what’s ahead for 2016—will the momentum continue?

Thanksgiving is right around the corner. For most of us, this holiday revolves around a full-table feast with turkey galore and all the festive trimmings. Delicious? Yes! But unfortunately, also wasteful in many cases. We thought this month presented a great opportunity to highlight some of the things we can (and should) be doing to reduce waste at home. Not just for this one holiday, but for the entire year.

Earlier this month I attended the Feeding America food recovery summit held in Washington, D.C. Since I focus on food waste prevention, I’m sometimes asked if there’s tension emerging between prevention and recovery. After all, if we prevent food waste from happening, doesn’t food recovery lose out?

In the United States, every day we throw away enough food to fill the Rose Bowl Stadium while at the same time one in six Americans face hunger. How can we turn these troubling statistics around? While there is no one solution, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Food Recovery Hierarchy (Figure 1) is a good place to start. Each level of the hierarchy has unique benefits, but this guide will focus on the second level from the top: feeding hungry people, or food donation.

Most Consumer Survey Respondents Say They Waste ‘Less than the Average American’ Last month the results from a unique consumer-focused food waste survey were released. The study was conducted in 2014 with research funded by the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future. As far as the researchers know, it’s the first nationally representative consumer-focused U.S. food waste survey of its kind. The survey asked a series of questions including how “aware” consumers are about wasted foods, what shapes their behavior, and what motivates t...