By Amanda Froelich at trueactivist.com
The company’s ultimate goal is to reduce food waste by 20% in the next five years.
Food waste is a major concern affecting every individual on the globe. It is estimated that in developed nations, the worst offender being the United States, nearly 40% of perfectly edible food is tossed into the trash because consumers aware unaware the expiration date is more of a ‘peak freshness’ label.
In effect, 1/3 of the food produced on this planet is wasted, while 795 million individuals still go to bed hungry each night.
This is a conundrum, and it needs to be remedied – fast.
Earlier this year France did its part to lessen food waste by banning supermarkets from purposely wasting good fare – as many stores do. Instead, the stores must donate any ‘expired’ foods and help the less fortunate.
A British supermarket chain is now following its lead. By December 2015, 150 of Marks & Spencer’s biggest stores will donate any extraneous products that are nearing their expiration dates. The company announced in a press release last Friday that its ultimate goal is to reduce food waste by 20% in the next five years.
Huff Post reports that the program is feeding people in need, cutting back on waste, and is also combating misunderstanding with regard to what expiration dates on food items actually mean.
Typically, ‘use by’ dates just indicate when a product has reached its “peak,” but don’t necessarily mean the food has spoiled at that time, Time reported in 2013. This is especially the case for packaged goods which don’t require refrigeration.
Marks & Spencer plans on doling out fruit, vegetables, bread, cakes, and groceries. By spring, all of its stores will be involved in the program, according to the release.
The company first launched the initiative with six stores in the Bristol and Bath areas. Since April, the stores redistributed nearly four tons of food to a number of local charities.
The initiative should be adopted by every grocery store to lessen food waste and ensure every individual on the planet is fed. Agree or disagree?
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Clearly agree.
I germany we got ” Die Tafel ” . It’s an organisation with the aim to support homeless and poor families to get cheap/free food. The big problem is that the biggest amount of this food they need to buy with the money our land gives them (you can guess it’s not many money). Some markets or even eg. farmers donate fruits, bread or other food. The amount of wasted food THAT YOU CAN EAT! is so big it’s a shame to even think about wasting it.
Just a funny fact. The markets even lose money if they waste those. Think about. After sort out it’s getting dumped, this cost’s money. Would they give it for free they wouldn’t lose money, they even saving the money they would otherwise need for the trash.