There’s a big campaign over here to reduce food waste. The Scottish Government’s Waste Aware Scotland program estimates that approximately one third of all food purchased is thrown in the rubbish bin. That’s a shockingly high amount. They estimate that the carbon emissions associated with producing, shipping and wasting that much food are equal to a quarter of the emissions produced by cars in Scotland each year.
I received my first edition of the Love Food, Hate Waste e-zine put out by Waste Aware Scotland this morning, and I was impressed. They have a number of chefs on board providing tips and recipes for everything from shopping, to storing, to portioning and to using leftovers creatively. As the same issues, and the same foodstuffs are available in Ontario, Ottawans could probably get a lot out of the e-zine and website as well.
As a Canadian living in Scotland I have a few observations about some things that might exacerbate food wastage over here. For one thing, most prepared foods come with two best before dates. The use before date that we’re used to in Canada, as well as the length of time the product is estimated to remain fresh in the fridge after opening. I’ll give you a few examples:
- Milk and yoghurt are given a life of 3 days after bottles are opened
- Real Organic Foods Tikka Balti sauce, 4 days
- Suma Pasta Sauces, 1 week
- Trees Can’t Dance Belizean Habanero Sauce , 1 month
- Meridian Foods Almond Butter, 3 months
While most of these products get eaten well before their expiry date in our household, we frequently drink milk and eat yoghurt that has been open for more than 3 days to no ill effect. For these products I’m confident that my sense of smell will tell me when it’s time to chuck them out. The process of making milk into yoghurt is an ancient means of preservation, so really yoghurt ought to last longer than milk after it’s been opened. Perhaps this over vigilance in labeling is partly responsible for the food wastage over here. Mind you, I imagine food waste stats in Canada are probably equally as horrifying.
December 6, 2008 at 2:05 pm
Wasting food is something I try not to do (with varying degrees of success!) But it can be hard since I live on my own and it seems like a lot of the food for sale at grocery stores comes in massive portions. I tend to make big batches of things like chili, soup, spaghetti sauce, and then freeze whatever amount I won’t be able to eat within a day or two. It also saves me time later on, when I can simply thaw out my own “pre-packaged” meal… much cheaper, healthier, and the packaging is re-used.