According to a report by Parliament’s Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs Committee, around £10bn worth of food, particularly vegetables, is thrown away every year, simply because it isn’t the ‘perfect shape.’
Chairman Neil Parish, MP for Tiverton and Honiton, said: “It’s ridiculous that perfectly good vegetables are wasted simply because they’re a funny shape.
Farmers supplying fruits and vegetables to UK supermarkets currently get their produce rejected on the grounds that it fails to meet cosmetic quality standards set by the big retailers.
“Knobbly carrots and parsnips don’t cook or taste any different. It’s high time we saved them from the supermarket reject bins,” said Parish.
Mr Parish also believes that economically, food waste costs restaurants, and hotels many thousands of pounds a year and causes increased disposal costs to local authorities.
The committee have made a range of suggestions, including a national reduction target to cut the food waste that costs the average person £200 a year, by introducing a comprehensive review of food date labelling, particularly “best before dates.” Education is also vital about this subject particularly targeting the young, who are tomorrow’s consumers. There has to be more funding for waste reduction body Wrap.
Other suggestions include requiring food businesses over a certain size to separate food waste for collection and increasing the amount of surplus food given to charities. There should be legislation introduced requiring supermarkets and other food outlets to publish data on the amount of food they throw out. However, Tesco is already doing this and it is being looked at by Sainsbury’s. Some supermarkets recently launched “wonky veg” lines which were positively received by shoppers.
Finally, Mr Parish added that “Socially, it is a scandal that people are going hungry and using food banks when so much produce is being wasted.
“And environmentally it is a disaster, because energy and resources are wasted in production only for the food to end up rotting in landfills where it produces methane – a potent climate-changing gas.”
This should certainly make us stop and think about how we can include and embrace our “knobby vegetables.”
We have to back Neil Parish and his colleagues, this waste is…Madness!
