American households waste approximately $240 billion worth of food every year, according to a new study from researchers at Penn State University, reports Food Business News. The research analyzed data from 4,000 households that participated in the USDA’s National Household Food Acquisition and Purchase Survey.
“Our findings are consistent with previous studies, which have shown that 30 percent to 40 percent of the total food supply in the United States goes uneaten — and that means that resources used to produce the uneaten food, including land, energy, water and labor, are wasted as well,” says lead researcher Edward C. Jaenicke, Ph.D., professor of agricultural economics in the College of Agricultural Sciences. “But this study is the first to identify and analyze the level of food waste for individual households, which has been nearly impossible to estimate because comprehensive, current data on uneaten food at the household level do not exist.” Full Story
Related: Meijer to Expand Food Waste Program; Report: Food Waste Happens Between Harvesting, Retail.
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