What can supermarkets do to reduce food waste?

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What can supermarkets do to reduce food waste?
Thanks for asking.
According to the World Wildlife Foundation, roughly a third of all food produced in the wild goes to waste. What's more, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation says that food waste accounts for a third of all human-caused greenhouse gas emissions and 8% of emissions in total. With that in mind, we might feel guilty when we don't finish our dinner or leave something in the fridge for too long and have to throw it out.
Those cases are obviously pretty avoidable, but imagine how bad it gets at the scale of a business like a supermarket. A report released earlier this year found that UK supermarkets were wasting as much as 200,000 tons of food. That food often ends up being used as animal food or to generate energy. Where do these problems come from? A big part of the food waste issue is to do with the special rules supermarkets have about how their own label food items are handled. These currently prevent the food being donated after its expiry date has passed.
Supermarkets also tend to overstock as they don't want their shoppers faced with empty shelves and considering a rival store instead. But consumers are becoming increasingly aware of the environmental issues relating to food waste and holding businesses responsible for their practices too. Thankfully, there are things that supermarkets can do and in some cases already do to deal with the issue. Let me guess, new technologies have a part to play, don't they? Indeed, they should be able to help prevent unsold products being thrown out after passing their expiry date. That's one of the leading causes of food waste in supermarkets. Automating date tracking reduces the margin for error compared to manual checks, saves time for busy supermarket staff, and makes it easier to offer discounts on items that are about to expire. Shoppers get a small reduction, the supermarket still makes some extra money, and most importantly, nothing goes to waste. A win-win situation, I think you'll agree. What about imperfect food items? Let's be honest, we can get a little fussy when picking fruit and veg in a supermarket, always choosing the apples that look the roundest or the straightest carrots. The thing is, some damage in the supply chain is inevitable. But that doesn't necessarily mean the food items aren't good to eat, so it's a real shame when they end up getting rejected and wasted as a result. Some supermarkets have launched initiatives to offer misshapen or damaged fruit and veg at discounted rates. These include Lidl, who first started its Too Good to Waste campaign back in 2016 Meanwhile, Tesco's has its own perfectly imperfect range. Most of the time, you'll be slicing your vegetables up before serving them anyway, so why not take advantage of the discounts on offer? By the time the food is on your plate, you'll have forgotten that it was ever wonky at all. There you have it. Now you know what supermarkets can do to reduce food waste. In under three minutes, we answer your questions and help you understand the true meaning behind trends, concepts and acronyms that are making headlines. Listen along and you will really know it for sure.
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