Just sharing my recent overview article looking at food waste through the lens of climate change and the role of waste reduction in sustainable food systems: Can Waste Reduction Move the Needle on Food Sustainability?
Some interesting stats from my analysis (all based on 2009 data, which I had used in my research in 2011-2012):
- Total estimate of avoidable food waste in the United States is 55.41 MMT/yr, which amounts to 28.7% of total annual production by weight. This translates to 180 kg/yr of total avoidable waste on a per-capita basis, of which 110 kg represents consumer waste.
- The total GHG emissions from the production, processing, packaging, distribution, retail, and disposal of the avoidable food waste in the U.S. amounts to 112.9 MMT CO2e per year - equivalent to about 2% of national emissions (this is more of a conservative lower bound).
- Avoidable consumer waste costs a typical U.S. famiy of four approximately US$1600 per year.
