_____ is a curiosity of modern life: It is one of the few issues on which there is universal agreement --- it's bad. Yet, ... it is also, paradoxically, an issue few people seem willing to do anything about.
An issue about which there is universal agreement? Sounds like a political winner! Hmmm... what could this mystery issue be? And what does our candidate have to say about it?
This diary was sparked by an article that I read on the subway yesterday called "Waste out of control, U.K. study finds". What struck me was the following statistic:
Consumers, for one, are spending more than 10 billion British pounds (about $19.5 billion Canadian) on food they don't eat. And all the rotting food pumps more than 18 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere. Stopping that would be the equivalent of taking one in five cars off the road.
And then a little later:
Waste food can end up in a landfill, where it is one of the main sources of greenhouse gases, particularly methane, which is more dangerous to the environment and traps more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. Already 38 per cent of Canada's methane emissions come from landfills ...
Hello! As someone who cares deeply about the environment and especially the issue of global warming, I was shocked by these figures (and embarrassed and surprised that I hadn't heard more about the impact of wasted food on the environment in the past). Although I imagine there are those here for whom this is old hat, I had to find out more.
Ya' Gotta Eat!! But...
A quick aside about my main exposure to the issue of wasting food (prior to last May): When I was an undergraduate at university, I was very fortunate that my grandparents happened to live nearby. Every Sunday, when the dorm cafeterias took the night off, my grandparents would have me over for dinner. This became a tradition that continued through all four years of my undergraduate days and, I believe, is responsible for the fact that my wife agreed to marry me (after meeting and falling in love with my grandmother). By the end of the four years, we had settled on pizza for our traditional Sunday night meal, but with my grandma, there were always 'fixins' and things on the side.
Just a bit more about my grandma (mainly because I miss her!). She fit the stereotypical Rockwell grandma nearly to a 'T'. My grandparents were farmers and among the truths that they held to be self evident were: (1) wasting food is a sin; (2) "ya gotta eat!"; (3) a "growin' boy" (defined as anyone under 30 years of age) has got to be hungry -- all of the time; (4) there is no such thing as unhealthy food (to the day my grandfather died of heart disease, my grandmother continued to cook with lard); (5) a meal must include at least one helping each of meat and potatoes (which to my grandmother's continual consternation and denial, I am allergic to). So it came to pass that frequently, after trying to politely eat as much of, say, the large pizza that my grandparents ordered especially for me, a "growing boy", (while the two of them shared a small one), I would have to politely excuse myself and go to their bathroom to barf, so I could come back and finish the rest and not be a sinner. (I was not bulimic. My grandmother refused to take "No, Thank You" or "I'm sorry, but I'm full" as an answer, happily telling me I was a growing boy and "ya gotta eat" as she'd dish another helping of mashed potatoes onto my plate.)
This diary is about truth #1 which, as a parent of a "finicky" child, has renewed resonance to me today (even before my fateful subway ride yesterday). I can't count how many times I've used variations of the mantra "Finish Your Dinner -- and not just the bread!! There are kids starving all over the planet who are literally begging for the food you are wasting!"
More than enough to chew on.
After I got to work yesterday, I couldn't get the article out of my mind. It seems that things have conspired in recent weeks to keep reminding me of this issue. First, there was the widely-cited article from the NY Times, "One Country's Table Scraps, Another Country's Meal" (which, in case you missed it, reported that Americans waste ~27% of our consumable food), closely followed by a major "summit" of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, written about many here at DailyKos, including on the front page and especially Asinus Asinum Fricat's recent diaries (one of which caused me to order two wonderful books on food from Peter Menzel and another of which, I just saw after writing this, is also about food waste). Yet, with the current worldwide crisis, the ubiquitous obesity epidemic in the US, the impossible-to-overstate importance (health-wise, socially, productivity-wise, etc.) of food in our day-to-day lives (indeed, for some of my relatives, their day literally revolves around their meals), etc., it's a wonder to me that we don't hear more about politics of food from our political candidates.
But what struck me for the first time yesterday and motivated me to write was the connection between food waste and the environment, in particular global warming. In recent years, I have become very conscious of my carbon footprint, yet when trying to calculate and reduce this, one thing I have rarely thought about was my eating habits. (Not just buying habits -- I try to buy locally, but eating habits.) I, like nearly everyone else I know, thinkknow wasting food is "bad", and for many reasons... yet, I have to honestly admit, I waste a bunch of it. (Even though we try to compost some of it, this isn't nearly a big enough percentage.) It's a "lifestyle thing". With two active kids, we're always in a hurry. And so planning meals falls by the wayside. Well, now I have yet another very important reason not to let it
Regarding the subway article, I was particularly curious about the source of the "one in five cars" stat (and also wanted more details, given that the article didn't specify a time period). The article didn't cite a source for this, but in several places it mentioned a blog called wastedfood.com, by Jonathan Bloom so I went there and am now--after less than two days-- a "loyal" reader and fan. Indeed, if nothing else comes of my particulr diary tonight, I hope that it will at least cause some of you to go over there and check out this worthwhile blog. (The title of the blog pretty much says it all.)
In my cursory research tonight, I found much about the environmental impacts of wasted food (not just at Bloom's blog, but elsewhere, and not just having to do with global warming, although that's where I'll focus for this diary). Among some of the most relevant stats I found there were:
- It takes seven times the amount of foossil energy to produce one unit of food energy
- Americans, on average, each throw away a little over a half of a pound of food per day at home, and more than half of the trash from restaurants is food.
- This adds up to a whopping 60,000,000,000 pounds of food waste to landfills every year.
- Food waste in landfills emits methane -- lots of it, a greenhouse gas at least 20 times more harmful than carbon dioxide (and responsible for about 20 percent of all global warming)
Poking around there, I also found many other worthy posts, such as
this one about the NY Times article I link to above, where Bloom makes the point that the amount is closer to 50% than the 27% stat the Times uses.
Bloom's blog isn't just about criticism either. It is chock full of good ideas for how to reduce your own food waste. Since I want you to actually go there, I'll just mention one of them. This point, while obvious to me now in retrospect, honed in directly on what I'd estimate to be the cause of perhaps 30% of my food waste: pantry organization. Basically, if you can't see it or find it, you won't eat it. Obvious, right? But yet, my disorganized pantry right now is testament to the fact that, despite the obviousness, I had not yet internalized the importance.
Of course, additional steps are needed, in addition to reducing our own personal waste. That's why this is a political issue, one that calls for action from our government at all levels, and why, I believe, this deserves attention here.