Most of the food worldwide is thrown away

UN: Most of the food worldwide is thrown away

09/14/2013

According to a recent UN report, more than a quarter of the world's arable land is used to produce food that ends up in garbage. And that while around 870 million people are starving.

Thrown away 1.3 billion tons
According to a recent report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Environment Program, around 1.3 billion tonnes of food ends up in trash every year. This massive waste not only causes enormous economic losses and huge environmental damage, but is morally reprehensible against the backdrop of 870 million people starving. The report „Food Wastage Footprint: Impacts on Natural Resources“ According to him, 28 percent of the world's total agricultural land is used to produce food that is never eaten.

Financial losses and environmental damage
The direct financial loss amounts to 565 billion euros per year, with this amount of discarded fish and seafood not even included. For the production of foods that are not consumed later, about 250 cubic kilometers of water are consumed annually. According to the report, this is three times more than per year flows through the Russian Volga. In addition, it would produce greenhouse gases every year, which would correspond to the impact of 3.3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide.

Changes urgently needed
According to the FAO report, 54 percent of wasted food is already lost during production, so-called post harvest and storage. Particularly affected by this part of the problem are developing countries. Waste in processing, delivery and consumption, with 46 per cent of affected foods worldwide, is more of a problem for industrialized countries. FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva said: „All of us - farmers and fishermen, food producers and supermarkets, local and national governments, and consumers - need to make a difference in every link in the human food chain to avoid food waste and otherwise recycle food.“

Expired best before date
In many industrialized countries, there are also often „ridiculous phenomena“, like not buying crooked vegetables. Or, the problem that the expiration date (MHD) is often misunderstood as the expiration date. For products that are packaged, exceeding the best before date does not mean that the food is no longer edible. As a rule, if a packaged food has a long shelf life, it can usually be consumed for longer than the specified retail price. Caution is advised with meat, fish, eggs and dairy products. For example, packaged meat whose use-by date has been exceeded should actually no longer be used, as otherwise severe food poisoning may occur, often resulting in diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting.

870 million people are starving
The FAO Director-General also criticizes waste in moral terms: „We can not allow one third of the food we produce to end up in the garbage when 870 million people are hungry at the same time.“ To feed today's world population of seven billion, there would actually be more than enough food. And what is even more thoughtful: There are researchers who assume an even greater waste, as stated in the UN report. They come to estimates that less than half of the world's food is consumed by humans.

Thrown away 82 pounds of food per German
The FAO report criticizes China, South Korea and Japan in particular. There, nearly 200 kilograms of fruit, vegetables and cereals would be wasted annually per person. But in this country, the numbers are high. According to a government study, each German citizen annually throws away nearly 82 kilos of food statistically in Germany. Nevertheless, consumer minister Ilse Aigner (CSU) sees the country on a good path, perhaps because of the campaign „Too good for the bin“. The minister says: „Trade, industry, churches, associations and consumer initiatives are pulling together. If other countries follow, we can achieve the European Commission's goal of halving the amount of recoverable food waste by 2020.“ (Ad)

Picture: Uschi Dreiucker