The food we throw away

Yes, you've seen it, all over the papers this morning, the way in which we throw away perfectly good food and thus waste money, waste resources and annoy Gaia. Here's the actual report.

One point that's worth picking up on:

Around 18% of UK GHG emissions are related to food production and consumption.

I will guarantee you that this is picked up on by various Greenie writers and used as evidence that we must indeed eat locally, stop transporting food and heavens to Betsy, we'd certainly better stop buying anything from Johnny Foreigner. The bit they won't go on to tell us is the next sentence.

Nearly half of these emissions come from farms, mostly in the form of methane and nitrous oxide that fall outside current UK domestic targets for carbon dioxide (CO2), and are beyond the scope of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme and other carbon pricing mechanisms

The reason they won't is that there's also been research from the US in recent weeks which breaks down which parts of the food production system cause the most emissions. Some 4% of the emissions (note, this is food production, not production and consumption combined) come from the transport between producer and retailer. The vast majority, over 85%, comes from the type of farming that is used for production. And it ain't necessarily true that organic or other so called "green" farming methods have lower emissions than more industrial types. The lowest emissions form of arable farming, for example, is no till, which relies upon both pesticides and herbicides (and really only gets going when you use GM modified crops as well).

Another point:

Here in the UK, widespread concern about higher food prices sits awkwardly alongside evidence showing that consumers throw away 4.1 million tonnes of food that could have been eaten – worth an average of £420 per household – every year

That amount thrown away: £ 8 a week it's worth to the average household. I think I'm right in saying that said average household has an income of the order of £25k a year (it's of that order, even if the figure is not entirely correct), or £500 per week. We are therefore talking about a sum which is 1.6% of the average budget. Not, when you think about it, a very large deal.

What we're throwing away and why we are comes from this earlier report from WRAP:

The main reasons for throwing away food that could have been eaten if it had been managed better are:

left on the plate after a meal (1,225,700 tonnes worth £3.3 billion);

passed its date (808,000 tonnes worth £2.2 billion);

looked, smelt or tasted bad (750,500 tonnes worth £1.8 billion);

went mouldy (465,700 tonnes worth £960 million); and

left over from cooking (360,600 tonnes worth £830 million).

Reasons are different for different types of food. For example:

bread: out of date 29%, looked bad 21%, went mouldy 20%;

breakfast cereals: 73% left over after a meal;

cheese: out of date 37%, went mouldy 23%;

eggs: out of date 56%, left over 25%;

fresh fruit: mouldy 37%, looked bad 25%;

salads: out of date 48%;

fresh meat and fish: out of date 35%, left over 26%;

milk: smelt or tasted bad 38%, out of date 37%;

pasta: left over 50%;

rice: left on plate 48%, left in saucepan 44%; and

condiments: out of date 34%, left over after cooking 26%, left on plate 20%.

Now OK, I'll agree that such things could be better managed. Anything and everything can be better managed if it comes to that (we'll not consider government for the moment, shall we, the lesson there being so blindingly obvious?). But better management comes at a cost.

If we're to shop more often in smaller quantities (to avoid those out of date or rotting problems), or if we're to plan our eating habits a little better, or make better use of leftovers in making a nourishing slop, well, all of those things take time.

And time does, as you might have noticed, have a value. If we stick with this average household we can tell what it is as well. Average wages are around the £10 an hour mark in the UK. So saving that £8 in food waste is worth it if it takes less than 45 minutes (roughly) per week. If it takes longer than that then people are being entirely rational in cooking a bit too much pasta, leaving the mustard on the side of the plate, buying that extra bag of salad just in case and then letting it rot.

Each and every individual will of course have their own ideas about this, whether such things are worth doing or not.

Moving on a little to the CO2 emissions that result from this:
Food waste alone results in unnecessary GHG emissions equivalent to 18 million tonnes of CO2 each year.

We are all, of course, supposed to be horribly shocked by this: look, look, our wasteful habits are killing Gaia! We should again look at the cost of time that might be spent in reducing this as against the damages done by such habits.

We have been told by the Stern Review what is the cost of a tonne of CO2 burped into the atmosphere: $85 a tonne. So 18 million, times $85, divide by two (roughly the exchange rate) divide by 24 million housholds and 52 weeks and we get: 60 pence per week. Or, in our rational average household whose time is worth £10 an hour, they should be willing to spend 3.6 minutes a week in protecting the planet from this waste.

Does anyone actually think that this waste can be halted in 3.6 minutes per week? No, then it's not rational to try and do so, is it? We make ourselves poorer by trying.

Sadly, this report, as with so many others on matters environmental (don't get me started on recycling: the time spent sorting for a full recycling programme costs more than the entire waste disposal system) makes one basic logical error.

They assume that the labour of human beings is worth nothing. Something which, if it were true, would mean I get my lawn mowed for free by civil servants on Saturday afternoons. As I've yet to note that happening I have to assume that civil servants, just as you and I do, place a value upon their time.

Now all we have to do is get the reports they write to reflect that mind-bogglingly obvious point.