Notebook Magazine – Stopping Food Waste in Australia
Every year, each Australian throws away 145 kg of food. As a nation, that is over $5 billion worth of food items. For every 5 bags of groceries a person buys a week, 1 of those goes straight in the rubbish bin. That's almost 20% of the food Australians purchase. In Victoria and South Australia, 40% of what people throw out is food. In Sydney, the statistics are even more alarming - 50% of bin contents are food waste.
It is for this reason that Notebook: magazine has teamed up with Planet Ark founder, Jon Dee, to launch the Stop Food Waste! campaign in its September issue. The purpose of this campaign is to raise awareness and serve up the practicalities of dealing with an issue that has global and personal, financial implications.
"Food waste in this country is an environmental and financial disaster," says Notebook: magazine Editor Caroline Roessler. "In an economic climate of rising fuel costs and interest rates, not to mention disastrous food shortages in the Third World and the enormous environmental implications, throwing away good food seems like utter madness."
Please check out the STOP FOOD WASTE website to learn more about this issue and post your ideas on how Australians can minimize the amount of food that is wasted.
In the landfill, rotting food decomposes to make methane and other gases. In addition to the smell, these are really bad greenhouse gases. The point is that food waste CAN be avoided. The first step is to learn more about what we are throwing out, then we can do something about it. Preventing food waste starts when you go shopping and continues at home in the way you store, cook and use food. First of all, it is very important to have a well stocked kitchen – especially of the essentials. Much of the food we waste comes from ‘perishables’ – things like fruit, vegetables and dairy products.