Global fruit and vegetable waste are a far-reaching problem with tremendous financial, ethical and environmental costs. The causes range from bumpy roads to overly selective customers, but regardless of cause, we can all pitch in to combat this global issue.
Majority of food is wasted in industrialized countries. Food waste occurs all along the later half of the supply chain with distributors, retailers, and restaurants as well. Few reasons for food waste include, All-you-can-ear buffets and buy-one-get-one deals encourage people to buy more they can eat. Supermarkets refuse to stock produce that is odd-looking but perfectly edible. Customers expect to find fully stocked shelves. The shelf stuffing encourages waste since products are more likely to reach their “sell-by” dates while still on the shelf. Many times, this surplus gets thrown away. Labels often confuse the customers. Misinterpretation of labels such as “best by”,” sell by” and “use by” causes customers to purge their refrigerators with edible food. People fail to realise that the labels are set by manufacturers and are not regulated by the governments. According to the European Commission, an estimated 10 percent of the EU’s 88 million annual tonnes of food waste are related to date labeling. |
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To gather more information on Fruit and Vegetable Management, we recommend watching the following TED talks. TED is a global non-profit community dedicated to sharing free knowledge and spreading important ideas with the power to change lives for the better. These talks are linked here with the kind permission of TED.
Videos related to Fruit Waste Management:
Videos related to Vegetable Waste Management:
Videos related to Fruit Waste Management:
- Put a value on nature - Pavan Sukhdev
- The global food waste scandal - Tristram Stuart
- Big data, small farms and a tale of two tomatoes - Erin Baumgartner
Videos related to Vegetable Waste Management: