Consumers Combating Food Waste by Composting, Planning Ahead and Sharing More

Food waste is top of mind these days. From consumers to countries, it seems like everyone is trying to help mitigate the issue. Find out how consumers are planing to tackle the issue going forward.

Food waste is top of mind these days. From consumers to countries, it seems like everyone is trying to help mitigate the issue. In fact just this week, the Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency announced their plan to continue efforts to reduce food waste by 50 percent in the next 15 years.

In an effort to gauge consumer concern regarding food waste, The Lempert Report polled the SupermarketGuru consumer panel, and here’s what we found.

Forty percent of consumers are extremely concerned about food waste in their homes, a similar amount is moderately concerned, while 20% are a little or not at all concerned.

Even though there is a lot of concern, it seems like consumers are doing a lot to combat waste. Forty-eight percent feel that very little of the food in their household goes to waste, while 44% reported that the amount is definitely less than half, but more than a quarter. (Four percent say half, while three percent say none goes to waste)

What foods go to waste most often? 77% reported fresh food, 63% refrigerated, 14% shelf stable and 13% frozen. The categories most cited were: vegetables (84%), fruit (73%), dairy (35%), bakery (28%), meat (26%), deli (22%) and leftovers.

Shopping more frequently and thus buying only what is necessary, is often a way to combat food waste, the plurality of those surveyed shop once a week (48%), while forty percent say they shop twice a week. The balance shops even less often.

Still nearly 90 percent will try to reduce food waste going forward. How will they do so? Here’s the list: plan meals better, buy less food overall, store foods in smarter ways (i.e avoid freezer burn), buy food closer to time of use, share leftovers, use leftovers, compost, store leftovers better, don’t buy foods that are on sale- if no plans to eat them!