Countries must start figuring out how much food they waste if they’re going to meet the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goal of halving global food waste and lowering food loss by 2030, says a report out by Champions 12.3, a coalition of government, business, and research organizations. Food waste occurs at the consumer and retail level, while food loss occurs on farms and in the food-distribution chain. The report sought to track the global progress of the U.N. Development goal, but it points out there are major gaps in data.
In the U.S., the USDA and EPA agreed last year to the “U.S. 2030 Food Loss and Waste Reduction Goal,” which like SDG 12.3 calls for a 50 percent reduction in levels of food waste and food loss by 2030. And in 2014, the African Union pledged to reduce food loss — a large issue than food waste — by 2025. EU states currently collect information on food waste, as do Japan, Thailand, and others. But many countries don’t track food waste, and so lack a baseline number to determine whether they’ve made improvement. Japan, for example, only records post-farm waste, while China only collects data on certain regions.
Champions 12.3 urged the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization to offer more clarity on what should be measured within SDG 12.3. For instance, do bones and citrus peels count as waste?
The report emphasizes the urgency of food waste as an environmental and food security issue. “If food loss and waste were its own country, it would be the third-largest greenhouse gas emitter, behind China and the U.S,” it says. In Africa alone, the food lost on farms could feed 300 million people. Food loss is high on the continent because of issues like poor storage facilities, lack of refrigeration and bad roads.