The Dirt On Food Waste

Samantha Smith / 10 minute read

The Dirt On Food Waste (And What You Can Do About It)

Recent studies find that as much as 40% of food produced in the U.S. is wasted. This waste comes at every stage of food production and distribution, but the consumer bears the most responsibility and food waste is fast becoming the largest single item in our waste stream and a major source of greenhouse gas emissions.

Things you can do right now:

Shop smarter by buying only what you can consume and eating fresh food first
Compost your food waste, either at home or through commercial composting
Support organizations that are working to combat food waste

According to a 2012 study by the NRDC, up to 400 pounds of food is wasted per person every year in the U.S. The cost to grow, process, transport and dispose of all this food is estimated to be over $200 billion dollars, or roughly $1,800 a year for a family of four.

Food waste occurs at every stage of the production and supply chain according to the USDA. At the farm level, pests can damage crops and in retail, spoilage can occur due to storage issues, over-ordering or the culling of damaged or blemished produce. But it is the consumer who is the biggest culprit by over-buying food in massive proportions and tossing it when uneaten. As one study from 2010 found, consumers throw away 21% or 90 billion pounds of the available food supply, compared to retail operations contributing 10%.

All of that wasted food has to go somewhere, and unfortunately it most often ends up in a landfill. That may not seem like a big deal, but when organics like food decompose in a landfill, they produce methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that, according to the Environmental Defense Fund is is 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide in the first two decades after its release. Wasted food now constitutes the largest single type of waste, amounting to 22% of discarded municipal solid waste, according to the EPA.

Food waste has become the third most important global problem to tackle, according to Project Drawdown, a comprehensive climate mitigation study that compiled a list of the 100 most “substantive solutions to global warming.” And according to the BBC, if food waste were a country, it would be the 3rd largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world.

The good news is that even though consumers are the largest contributors of food waste, that makes us the most well-positioned to make the biggest dent in the problem. Our government has also joined the charge and in 2015, the USDA and the EPA set a goal to cut food waste in half by the year 2030.

The Food Recovery Hierarchy was created by the EPA to prioritize actions to reduce food waste.
Source reduction is the number one solution and refers to reducing the volume of surplus food generated. Consumers can make a dent here by shopping smarter, storing food better and eating fresh food first. The NRDC’s advocacy website savethefood.com has tips to help consumers plan, store and use up the food they buy including a handy “Guest-Imator” to estimate the amount of food you will need for events and parties. These tools will not only help you cut down on food waste, they’ll save you money as well.

Besides source reduction, there are many groups that have sprung up to use leftover food to feed people who are hungry. It is estimated that over 54 million people will experience food insecurity in 2020, according to the website Feeding America. There are many apps available to help connect people to food that might be wasted, including Replate, Food For All and Food Cowboy who claim they “Act like Match.com for food waste.” These services connect surplus or unwanted food with consumers and charities like food banks and soup kitchens, using technology and the sharing economy to combat food waste.

The COVID-19 Pandemic has also exacerbated the problem of food waste as many farms lost their markets due to restaurant, school and hotel closures. This issue has spawned a new student-run organization called Farm Link that connects farms with food banks to distribute their excess food. To date the service has delivered over 11 million meals, according to their website.

Feeding animals is another option to reduce food waste and avoid the landfill and one that humans have been doing ever since we first domesticated livestock. Large cafeterias or foodservice operations can coordinate with local farms to provide excess food for animals like the startup Grub Tubs in Austin, TX, or the Rutgers University partnership with Pinter Farms in New Jersey, where they collect on average more than a ton of food scraps per day to use as local pig and cattle feed.

Besides trying to feed hungry people and animals, composting is the last best option to keep food out of the landfill. Many municipalities have commercial composting available to residents for food scraps. To check for compost facilities near you, try the Sustainable Packaging Coalition’s interactive map or contact your local waste hauler.

If your area doesn’t have commercial composting, try backyard composting. You can get set up using our handy guide here. If you don’t have a backyard to compost in, check out this guide to composting in your apartment put out by Sustainable America. They outline some easy ways to get started that are efficient and rewarding, especially if you cringe every time you throw away those valuable food scraps.

For people who don’t have the space or ability to compost at home, compost pickup services are popping up in different communities, like Denver’s Scraps Mile High or Compost Now in North Carolina. For a small fee, these services truck (or bike!) your kitchen scraps to composters in the area, reducing your waste stream and turning it into rich soil.

Whichever way you choose to get involved, reducing food waste is going to take everyone’s creativity and commitment. This issue is critical and one everyone can tackle by taking small steps to plan your food purchases more carefully, reduce waste and be an advocate in your community.

Things you can do right now: