Food Waste In America Essay

“Globally, we throw out about 1.3 billion tons of food a year, or a third of all the food that we grow” (Sengupta). In the United States 33% is from agriculture, 11% from postharvest, 10% from processing, 8% from retail, and 39% from consumption. Consumers are the majority of our waste, but there's not a lot of ways to prevent this.

Americans account for only five percent of the world’s population, but create half of the globe’s solid waste. Americans toss out the equivalent of $165 billion in food each year. All of that time, energy, and freshwater- for nothing. How can the United States, being so small in number, produce so much waste? Brad Plumer from the Washington Post documented a recent report from the Natural Resources Defense Council that attempts to track America’s food, from “farm to fork.” Plumer breaks the report down into seven different wasteful places along the American food production line: Farming, post-harvest and packing, processing and distribution, retail and grocery stores, food service and restaurants, households, and disposal.

A European or North American consumer wastes almost 100 kilograms of food annually, which is more than his or her weight. Reducing the amount of food that is produced in the United States has been a great challenge for decades for the American Society. One of the great challenges that is preventing the solution to this issue is that the major part of the society is not recognizing the effect of this issue. Similarly, in his article “Can We End America’s Massive Food Waste Problem?”, the author Mr. Karim Chrobog discusses how aware are the American people on matter of food waste and the major reasons why the wastage of food is growing fast in the United States. Chrobog explains that different advertisements have changed how consumers choose their food making them to be picky on how they get their food products. Furthermore, he presents some statics that explains the food wasted in the United States is much larger than any other country in the world. In addition, he claims that expire date labels and the food not meeting the consumer standards in the stores are the major causes of the food waste that is happening today. He demonstrates that technology can be used a means of solution to combat the issue of food waste by presenting an app that has helped in the reduction of food waste by cooperating restaurants and stores with charity organizations feeding hungry people the food that was going to be wasted. Consequently, he stated that people

One in seven American households lack a proper amount of food to maintain a healthy lifestyle. United States waste 133 billion pounds of food yearly. In 2010, supermarkets and grocery stores in the US tossed out 43 billion pounds, or $46.7 billion worth of food. (Dvorsky) Even with so many people in need of food it is unbelievable the amount of food going to waste at markets and restaurants. Given how many people go hungry in the United States each year, it is clear that an immediate change is necessary. There are many reasons why grocery stores should be forced to donate there pre-expired food, mainly to help those people not getting enough food, to reduce the amount of waste going to landfills.

There are billions of people struggling every day to have enough to eat, and billions of tons of food being tossed in the garbage, food waste is gaining increasing awareness as a serious environmental and economic issue. Research shows that about 60 million metric tons of food is wasted a year in the United States, with an estimated value of $162 billion. About 32 million tons of it end up in landfills, at a cost of about $1.5 billion a year to local government this economic crisis is worldwide! My research estimates that a third of all the food produced in the world is never consumed, and the total cost of that food waste could be as high as $400 billion a year. The food discarded by retailers and consumers in the most developed countries would be more than enough to feed all of the world’s hungry people, but it is not just those countries that have problems with food waste, it is also an issue in African countries like South Africa. The problem is expected to grow worse as the world’s population increases, unless actions are taken to reduce the waste. Food waste is not only a social cost, but it contributes to growing environmental problems like global warming, experts say, with the production of food consuming vast quantities of water, fertilizer and land. The fuel that is burned to process, refrigerate and transport it also adds to the environmental cost. Most food waste is thrown away in landfills, where it decomposes and emits methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

The issue of food waste is one that many people might not consider to be serious, but it is critical to the environment that a solution is devised. Fortunately, there are many simple things that people all over the world can do to keep the Earth healthy. First, if farmers and agricultural employees would prevent overgrazing, pesticide pollution, and over plowing, water would be saved, and the general health of the

The USDA claims that each year, 25.9 million tons of America’s food is thrown away, the equivalent to a quarter of the total amount produced. Nationally, the wasted food is a damaging financial setback, amounting to $1 billion just to get rid of during a time of ascending food prices, nonetheless (Oliver, 2007). Food waste has skyrocketed since 1970 at an astonishing 50% increase rate, yet according to the FAO, one-sixth of America doesn’t get enough to eat.

Household waste and the way Americans dispose of their trash is a huge source of food waste, if not the biggest. According to the article, Food waste within food supply chains: quantification and potential for change to 2050, American families throw out between 14 and 25 percent of the food and beverages they buy, costing the average family between $1,365 to $2,275 annually. A big factor of how America families are able to waste so much food is that food has become very cheap and readily available. Food costs less in the United States than nearly anywhere else in the world. As Brad Plumer said, “Most people reason, what's the big deal if some of it gets tossed?” They think there is no big harm in throwing away food because it was not that expensive, but in reality, it all just piles up. There is also a lot of confusion around expiration labels, with there being more than 10 different variations of expiration date phrasing. The different phrases tend to puzzle people and often prompt them to throw out food before its time. People think that "best if used by" means that food item cannot be eaten past that date or they will get sick. The same applies for "better if used by" and "sell by." People often just toss food out early and stay on the safe side. "Best if used by," usually applies mostly to non-perishable foods. The term describes product quality, where the product may not taste as good as it would if it were fresher but is still safe to eat or drink. The "use by" date

With a world population verging on eight billion, the effective use of resources has never been more critical in securing mankind’s future success. Costing individuals, communities, and global society tremendous amounts of money to address, food waste presents an elephantine handicap on the well-being of humanity. Especially in the United States, where billions of pounds of food are wasted annually and an estimated one-seventh of the population is food-insecure, taking an abundance of resources for granted is an irresponsible and unsustainable practice. If our nation is to reform its flawed systems of subsidized overproduction, waste management, and excess redistribution, ideological and economic overhauls must be initiated.

Many resources and labor go toward the production and manufacturing of food products, but these precious resources and labor go to waste when massive amounts of unwanted food products are disposed of. In the U.S, around 10% of the energy budget goes into packaging and transporting food products, as well as 50% of the land and 80% of the freshwater is used up in the production of food products (Ganders 1). In America 40% of the food produced goes unused, and is instead thrown away and transported to a landfill. The sheer amount of food discarded in America is estimated to be about $165 billion per year (Ganders 1). Decreasing food waste by only 15% could feed more than 25 million Americans in need of food (Gunders 1). As much as 1/6 of Americans

The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the importance of waste; a byproduct of consuming and/or producing food. Whether it came from the grocery store, corner store deli, or even from a favorite restaurant, it is apparent that in our current industrial food system, waste from food is not disappearing anytime soon. Furthermore, in a recent report by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), in 2010, out of the 430 billion tons of available food produced in the United States, approximately 133 billion tons of food were uneaten (Buzby et al, 2014). For this assignment, I documented, (approximately) weighed, and photographed the waste that accumulated at my residence

Wasting food is a bad habit that affects all of society and we continue to implicate ourselves in the problem. Of the total of food loss that is going on about 40 percent is in the household. Overall a typical household of four loses about 600 dollars in food a year. (Jones 11)

While the world’s farmers produce enough food to feed the planet, one-third of the food produced for human consumption is not really consumed. Globally, there exists up to 1.3 billion metric tons of uneaten food very year. And in addition to that, growing and transporting that food is estimated to create 3.3 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions per year, which makes wasted food one of the world’s largest emission contributor.

The everyday American on average wastes an astonishing twenty pounds of food each month (Gunders). Food waste is defined, as food that was intended for human consumption but was never eaten. Food waste in America is a massive problem; perfectly edible food is spoiled and discarded at every section of the food supply chain, which causes severe consequences for the environment and the economy. If Americans wasted 5% less food, the country as a whole would save fifty million dollars yearly (Hall). Not only would reducing food waste help save money but also it would immensely help climate change, as decomposing food in landfills creates methane gas. CO2 is known as the main culprit of climate change however; although methane gas is less talked

Food waste is a huge problem most americans are completely oblivious too. According to a United states department of Agriculture report, 133 billion pounds of food went unused in 2010. While animal products like meat and dairy being towards the top of the list, added up to $105 billion of wasted food.( Waste Not, Want not 26) While worldwide about one third of all food produced is either lost or gone to waste which adds up to about 1.3 Billion tons of waste.