We’re slashing food waste to save money...and the planet
SHOPPERS buying too much food have gone back to binning a fifth of it now lockdown has lifted.
Around 70 per cent of people are in the “high food waste” category – up from two in 10 last April.
The charity Waste and Resources Action Programme (Wrap) says 70 per cent of the UK’s waste – equal to more than £14billion a year and 20 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions – comes from households.
And research by meal plan delivery service KBK suggested yesterday that shoppers overbuying fresh products are mainly to blame for the problem.
But people are growing more aware of the issue, such as the Banfield family.They are on a mission to live green and lean to help save the environment and cash.
Father-of-three Joe, 43, tips any scraps into a food caddy. It is thrown in the garden waste three times a week when it is full of banana skins, eggshells and tea bags.
Speaking at their home in Milton Keynes, Bucks, Joe said: “Our main problem is with fruit. If I buy a load of apples at the start of the week and we don’t eat them, by the end of the week
the kids won’t eat them because they’re ‘too soft’.
“Apart from fruit we don’t waste very much as we will freeze things if they get close to the use-by dates.”
Key workers Joe and his wife Mandy, 43, and children Amelie, 10, Archie, six, and Ayla, four, have shared their eco-friendly journey for the Daily Express Green Britain Needs You campaign.
Mandy uses a meal planner each Sunday to get an idea of what
food they will enjoy throughout the week.
She said: “We have really busy schedules so if I don’t plan the meals we end up doing lots of smaller, rushed trips to the shop.
“I try to plan a couple of meals in close succession that use similar ingredients to save waste using fresh food.”
The family says it is “100 per cent” important that supermarkets donate unsold food to charities and Mandy says most best-before dates are “ridiculous” because the food is still edible.
She said: “Why waste good food? Last Christmas a lot of the supermarkets donated any food rather than seeing all the surplus wasted and that was brilliant.”
The Banfields now aim to buy from refill sections of supermarkets or shops that sell non-packaged food. They also make their own beeswax wraps rather than use cling film or foil. They say slashing food waste is important to cut carbon emissions during production, transport and packaging, save money and “be more aware and grateful for what we are lucky enough to have”.
In 2018 the UK produced around 9.5 million tons of food waste,Wrap found.The consumable food wasted that year cost £19billion – around £284 for every person in the country.
The charity’s figures show wasted food emits more than 25 million tons of greenhouse gases every year.