Less Waste, More Taste: Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste
In Spain, around 1.3 million tons of food are wasted every yearDespite most of this waste occurring at household level (60%), the impact of food services and retail sector is still significant. Focusing on European data, 8 million tons of food are annually discarded, which means that each person wastes around around 30 kg of food per year, being the Netherlans or Belgium the countries where more food is wasted.
This alarming data poses two relevant consequences both environmental and social. food waste causes between 8-10% of GHGemissions. In addition, it is estimated that 670 million people (8% of world population) suffer from malnutrition or hunger.
Considering this context, it is urgent to update our food value chain and consumption patterns to earn an optimized used and ethically distribution of the resources. Thus, since 2020, each 29th of September we celebrate the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste (IDAFLW), co-convened by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
This initiative aims to raise awareness regarding the impact of Food Loss and Waste targeting all the actors involved in the food value chains from producers to consumers. They intend to earn 2030 agenda aims such as reducing food waste by 10% in processing and manufacturingor by 30% in retail, restaurants and households.
Through this campaign, European Commission is:
- Organizing a series of activities such as hosting webinar (The Power of Parnerships: Driving Food Waste Reduction,(https://food.ec.europa.eu/food-safety/food-waste/international-day-awareness-food-loss-and-waste_en)
- Managing of EU Platform on Food Losses and Food Waste (https://food.ec.europa.eu/food-safety/food-waste/eu-actions-against-food-waste/eu-platform-food-losses-and-food-waste_en), that offers guidelines and materials to implement actions that positively impact on Food Loss and Waste reduction
- Funding projects aiming to reinforce and support the FAO & UNEP goal.
One of these funded activities is the SPRINT project, a proposal co-funded by the European Union through the Single Market Programme. Aligned with IDAFLW day aims, SPRINT’s partners cooperate to gather insights about the reasons behind Food Loss and Waste in three different scenarios: food service sector (restaurants, catering, …), supermarkets and households.
The strength of SPRINT approach relies in the direct implication and co-creative methodology that involves stakeholders directly linked to these three scenarios, as well as developed adapted solutions to each sector and target challenge.
SPRINT is currently at the implementation phase which means that the co-designed solutions are being incorporated and validated within the corresponding real scenarios. In parallel and to maximize the impact leveraging SPRINT solutions beyond its natural boundaries, the partners are disseminating the project aims and preliminary results in different relevant forums as well as organizing workshops to cover some topics such as the new pioneering Spanish law against Food Loss and Waste or Smart cooking with leftovers. Altogether SPRINT will undoubtedly contribute to IDAFLW objectives increasing social awareness and offering innovative solutions to finally arise the ambitious goal of Zero Food Waste.
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