Half of global food production never gets eaten

Half of the food produced in the world is thrown away every year even before it reaches a human mouth, says a new research by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IME). Alarmingly, around two billion tonnes of the world’s produce goes as waste every year, caused by poor infrastructure and storage facilities, over-strict sell-by dates, “get-one-free” offers, and finickiness of consumer.

Each year countries across the world produce four billion tonnes of food, but between 30-50% of this food never gets eaten, claims the IME’s ‘Global Food; Waste Not, Want Not’ report. In the UK, up to 30% of vegetable crops are not harvested because of their cosmetic imperfections, meaning they do not meet the consumers’ expectations of ‘good-looking’ food. The report says that half of the food bought in the UK and the US is thrown away before consumption.


On top of this we know that UK consumers throw away about 7 million tonnes of food waste each year so there is clearly huge scope for improvements in the entire system from farm to fork and this can save us all money and reduce the environmental impacts associated too.

Read the full report here http://www.imeche.org/Libraries/Reports/IMechE_Global_Food_Report.sflb.ashx