Experts call for more food waste awareness
Greece throws out more even than wealthy European countries, despite recent economic crisis
At least a billion portions of food are thrown out every day across the globe, with the annual cost of food waste coming to around a trillion dollars, just as 783 million people face hunger and starvation every year, of whom 150 million are children, the United Nations has said in its annual report on the issue, underlining the need to stop throwing away food that is essential to others. And Greece is by no means free of sin, as it is ranked as one of Europe’s top food wasters.
According to the report – which used the latest available data from Eurostat – Greeks threw out more than 2 million tons of food in 2020, with annual per capita waste coming to 191 kilograms, of which 87 kg per capita per year came from households. This puts Greece in fourth place among EU member-states, with the bloc average coming to 70 kg per household per year. On a global level, average annual food waste per household comes to 79 kg, the UN reported. It also noted that when it comes to food waste by households in particular, Greece ranks third in per capita terms in the EU, coming behind Portugal (124 kg/capita) and Malta (92 kg/per capita).
Commenting on the findings of the UN report, the executive director of Food Bank Greece, a nonprofit dedicated to battling hunger and food waste, Dimitris Nentas, notes the paradox of Greece throwing out more food even than wealthy European countries, despite recent hardships caused by the decade-long economic crisis and the pandemic lockdowns.
“A significant portion of this food is valuable, since it is suitable for consumption, but even if it were not, it could be used in other forms, in the context of a cyclical economy,” he laments.
Noting that 46% of food waste in Greece comes from households, Nentas argues that a campaign to raise awareness among consumers would probably go a long way toward addressing the phenomenon, by helping households “find ways to cook the quantities we need, handling products we do not consume immediately and shopping only for what we need.”
He also notes “a great deal of confusion” among consumers regarding expiry and use-by dates, explaining that a product with a “best used by” recommendation can be safely consumed a day or two after that date and does not need to be thrown out.
For his part, the head of the International Food Waste Coalition (IFWC), Stephane Leroux, believes that much of the problem comes down to lifestyle. “We belong to a society that enjoys consumption,” and “people – especially in wealthy countries – tend not to understand the value of food.”
Leroux believes that the availability of cheap industrially produced food explains why even poor households are wasteful in cities, whereas in the countryside, “people throw out less food because they know the effort that goes into producing it.”
Nentas agrees that food waste is partly a matter of culture, which concerns both the models of consumer and producer behavior.
“There are entire studies showing that consumers demand certain aesthetic criteria when it comes to fresh fruit and vegetables. Would we buy a crooked carrot? How would a company deal with a crop of apples that are smaller than the usual? The behavior of the average consumer affects the behavior of producers, traders and professionals,” he says as a case in point.
For Nentas, services like restaurants, hotels and canteens are also to blame for the huge amount of food that goes to waste. “The closer food management points are to the consumer, the harder it is to manage and reuse any food,” he says, adding that a lot of food is thrown out by such businesses because it is not consumed and cannot be carried over to the next day. “Those managing kitchens need to plan and manage their quantities more efficiently,” he says.
Leroux also sounds the alarm about the environmental impact of food waste, saying that “if it were a country, it would be the world’s third-biggest greenhouse gas emitter.”
Indeed, the UN report notes that food waste is responsible for around 8-10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and would, in terms of area, cover nearly 30% of the planet’s farmland.
Asked whether curbing food waste would help tackle global hunger, Leroux comments that “it is a realistic goal, but it will not be attained simply because we’re talking about it.”
