The International Day of Awareness on Food Loss and Waste was celebrated for the first time on 29 September with a virtual global event attended by speakers from around the world, to identify ideas and concrete solutions. The Day was established in December 2019 by the FAO, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, in collaboration with UNEP, the United Nations Environment Programme. It was created as a call to action to invite everyone, from institutions to citizens, to do more to combat world hunger and promote food systems that are fairer, but also more ecological and efficient, avoiding a collapse of food security and an impoverishment of natural resources.

Food loss and waste: a humanitarian and environmental emergency

Around 690 million people worldwide suffer from hunger (a number that has been rising steadily over the past five years), while three billion cannot afford a healthy diet. This year, moreover, the Covid-19 pandemic is threatening the food security of a further 132 million people and is causing movement and transport restrictions that are contributing to increased food losses. Aside from the health emergency, every year approximately 14 per cent of the world's food, worth 400 billion dollars, is lost before it even reaches the market. While food losses affect the food supply chain from the producer onwards, waste concerns retail, the catering industry and the domestic environment. New estimates on food waste are expected in 2021, but the data released so far point to 1.3 billion tonnes of food per year, equivalent to one third of total production intended for human consumption. Food loss and waste also have environmental repercussions, as they are estimated to generate 8 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, not to mention the enormous exploitation of resources. Reducing losses and waste therefore means more food for everyone, less pollution and less pressure on the environment, greater productivity and economic growth.

Food and Agriculture Organization @FAO

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The #COVID19 pandemic is a wake-up call to rethink the way in which we produce, handle and waste our food!

Here are some tips on how we can all reduce our #foodwaste 👇

#FLWDay

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A global discussion

The International Day of Awareness on Food Loss and Waste was celebrated with a virtual global event attended by representatives of the United Nations, the European Commission, the public and private sectors, agriculture ministries from both developing and developed countries, as well as organisations and associations of farmers, traders and consumers, universities and chefs. Participants shared the need to come together and step up efforts to reduce food loss and waste, to harness the benefits offered by innovation, technology and training, to discourage the habit of throwing food away, to measure and track progress made, and to collaborate so as to increase food availability and reduce the environmental footprint of agricultural production.

FAO Director-General QU Dongyu @FAODG

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World marks today 1st International Day of Awareness of Food Loss & Waste. 690m people are hungry & 3B can't access #healthydiet. Yet, so much food is lost before reaching consumers, or wasted after purchases. As @Pontifex notes: "To throw food away means to throw people away."

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How to reduce losses and waste: possible solutions

Among the solutions identified for reducing food waste are data sharing to pinpoint the stages of the food supply chain where the greatest losses occur, applied innovation, such as e-commerce platforms, incentives to strengthen the action of the private sector, investment in training, technology and innovation also for small producers, improved packaging performance and a relaxation of regulations and standards on aesthetic requirements for fruit and vegetables, the redistribution of food surpluses, the promotion of short supply chains, and investment in infrastructure and logistics to improve cold chains and the sustainability of cooling technologies. Where these practices have been adopted, positive results have been recorded: in Rwanda, a new African centre of excellence for a sustainable cold chain is helping farmers to bring their produce to market quickly and efficiently, reducing food waste, increasing profits and creating jobs.

The 15 daily actions against food loss and waste

From the large scale to the small, we can all do our part. On the occasion of the first International Day of Awareness on Food Loss and Waste, FAO published a list of 15 actions that everyone can put into practice every day. Here they are:

1. Adopt a healthy and sustainable diet;
2. buy only the food you need, by planning meals, making a shopping list and resisting impulse purchases;
3. also buy fruit and vegetables that do not meet aesthetic standards, but are still good to eat;
4. store food correctly by using airtight containers and sealing bags properly;
5. know how to read product labels to understand the difference between "use by" and "best before" dates and to avoid trans fats and added sugars;
6. eat small portions at home and share large portions in restaurants;
7. make the most of leftovers by freezing them or using them in new dishes;
8. use leftovers for composting;
9. respect food, that is, be aware of the efforts and resources required to produce it;
10. support local producers to benefit your own community and reduce pollution caused by transport;
11. eat fish from more abundant fish stocks such as mackerel or herring rather than those that are overfished such as cod and tuna, and buy fish that has been caught sustainably;
12. use less water and do not waste it;
13. keep land and waterways clean and do not litter;
14. eat more vegetables and pulses;
15. share — that is, donate food that would otherwise go to waste and thereby also look after others.