Food Wastage Impact

A report recently released from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations estimates that each year, approximately one-third of all food produced for human consumption in the world is lost or wasted. This is an area that hasn't yet been examined as to the impacts of global food wastage from an environmental perspective.

Field reporter Greg Martin has more

Martin: According to the FAO's report's executive summary, the loss of land, water and biodiversity, as well as the negative impacts of climate change, represent huge costs to society that are yet to be quantified. The direct economic cost of food wastage of agricultural products, based on producer prices only, is about USD 750 billion, equivalent to the GDP of Switzerland.

With such figures, it seems clear that a reduction of food wastage at global, regional, and national scales would have a substantial positive effect on natural and societal resources. Food wastage reduction would not only avoid pressure on scarce natural resources but also decrease the need to raise food production by 60 percent in order to meet the 2050 population demand."

Thanks Greg.

The global carbon footprint, excluding land use change, has been estimated at 3.3 Gtonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2007. If integrated into a country ranking of top CO2 emitters, food wastage would appear third, after USA and China, according to the latest data available. This amount is more than twice the total greenhouse gas emissions of all USA road transportation in 2010.