Food waste turns stomachs in environmental circles

Christmas has become a traditional time for over indulgence in Western countries. The holiday season seems to provide everyone with an excuse to eat and drink to excess. Supermarkets burst with sweet treats and a mind-boggling selection of festive fare.

While most of it will be ingested, more than a third of food in Europe and the United States will grow moldy fur in the back of the fridge, pass its use-by date and land in garbage.

Huge food waste problem developing in Europe



In the United Kingdom, one of Europe's worst food waste offenders, around 6.7 million tons of purchased and edible food, worth £10.2 billion (11.2 billion euros, $16.6 billion), are annually discarded. Around 4.1 million tons of this wasted food comes directly from food manufacturers.



Revelers throw tomatoes at each other during the annual food fight, the Tomatina, in the small Spanish town of Bunol, Spain, Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2007. Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: One third of the food produced in Europe is thrown away

"Only 30 to 40 percent of produced in Europe ends up at your table," Henrik Harjula, the principal administrator at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris, told Deutsche Welle. "It is already disappearing when it is transported, when it is rotting and when it doesn't meet European standards. On top of this, in many countries in Europe, one third of the food that consumers buy is thrown away and 50 percent of that is thrown away without even being opened."

Add Europe's waste to that of the United States and the food waste problem becomes even larger. Around 40 percent of all food manufactured and put on sale in the United States is wasted, and studies show this trend is increasing. Food waste - including waste from farms, manufacturers, retailers and consumers - has risen 50 percent since 1974, reaching about 150 trillion calories per year in 2003.

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