Jane Powerson food waste
In the UK in 2005, 30 to 40 per cent of food was thrown out, according to the BBC Radio 4 programme Costing the Earth. At the same time, a 10-year study carried out by the University of Arizona showed that 40 to 50 per cent of food produced in the US never met a human mouth. On this island, our behaviour tends to mirror that of our American neighbours rather than that of the British, but even if we're throwing out "only" 30 per cent of our food, it's a shocking statistic.
It's not just good victuals that are being wasted: each food item drags a long trail of energy and other inputs behind it. These include the pesticides and fertilisers that are used to grow it (or in the case of meat or dairy, that are used for the crops that feed the animal); the fuels that are burned to operate the farm and food processing machinery; and the many, many gallons of water expended in making edibles fit for the market. And let's not forget the "food miles" travelled in bringing the produce from farm to processors to retail outlet - a cost that involves fossil fuels, wear and tear on vehicles and refrigeration units, and congestion on roads. And then there's packaging, of course. When we don't eat our food, all of this is for nowt.
But the environmental cost of uneaten dinners doesn't stop there. The unwanted stuff has to be disposed of. And in most cases this means transporting it to landfill (more food miles, or perhaps "ex-food" miles would be more appropriate) where it settles down to rot. But it doesn't rot quietly, because it belches out great quantities of methane, a greenhouse gas with a global warming potential 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. An anaerobic digester can capture this gas and convert it into bioenergy, but there are only a handful of these devices in Ireland - so most of our methane goes off into the wide blue yonder.
Not all the food grown makes it to the shops: some of it is ploughed back into the ground, or rejected by fussy supermarkets, which demand blemish-free, characterless vegetables - especially root crops. In the UK, 5 to 20 per cent of farmers' crops are discarded.
Our food used to cost a quarter of our total income; now its purchase requires only a tenth. Perhaps it's not surprising we've forgotten to eat it.