While 2019 registered 35.2 million people living in food-insecure households, during that same year around a third of the food produced in the country — worth around $408 billion dollars — went to waste.
By 2030, the government aims to cut that amount in half — an incredibly difficult undertaking given the complexities of the food value chain. A new initiative, however, is here to make things easier.
Launched by the nonprofit ReFed, the new project consists of a website that shares useful information about inefficiencies in the food system and maps out potential solutions.
At restaurants, for example, where much of the food is wasted because the portions are too large and remain unfinished, shrinking portions could divert 2.4 million tons of waste annually, avoiding 11.5 million tons of CO2 emissions and saving $9 billion.
Meal kits are a surprisingly effective way to cut household waste, with the potential to reduce about 1.75 million tons of food waste because home cooks have just the right amount of ingredients they need to cook a meal.
Emerging technologies can help grocery stores plan demand more efficiently, along with apps that let shoppers know about sales on food just before it’s about to expire. New tracking technology can also help better route produce around the country so food with the shortest shelf-life covers the shortest distance.
The website’s list of interventions goes on, and the data about current waste and solutions are regularly updated. “Rather than just creating a report for a field that is changing so quickly, we thought, let’s create an online data hub that can grow and evolve,” says Dana Gunders, executive director of ReFed.
The tool is aimed at all stakeholders in the food system, including, policymakers, investors, philanthropists, and, critically, people working inside food companies. “We’re really hoping this gives internal champions within food companies the ability to identify the best solutions, and then be armed with information to make the case for them within their companies,” Gunders says.
