“We waste enough food to feed three billion people”
By Kaela Chow, Charmaine Lie, and Lily Ng
There are 7.8 billion people on the planet, yet according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, 925 million people are starving! Annually, we waste 1.3 billion tons of food, a seismic figure large enough to feed three billion people.
As part of our REAL (Renaissance Engages in Active/Applied/Authentic Learning) exploration, the Year 9 Eatrite Team is focusing on food and nutrition. Our REAL goal is to support the reduction of food waste and to spread awareness within RCHK as well as in Hong Kong.
School is an excellent place to start reducing food waste, as this is where we as students can make an impact. Our RCHK community has been doing a good job of promoting sustainable practices, such as recycling mugs and dishes and introducing meat-free day.
According to the United Nations, “Food waste refers to food that completes the food supply chain to a final product, but does not get consumed even though it is edible.”
Firstly, food waste occurs in common, non-catering areas such as schools, households, and workplaces. For instance, if we are in a restaurant and eat only a portion of our meal, then the rest thrown would be considered as food waste. While appearing as negligible quantities at first, it should be remembered that the effect is compounded by the millions in our position. Secondly, buying more than we need and discarding it later also leads to food waste.
The overall food waste results in a loss of money, time, energy, land, and many other essential resources. According to the Environment Protection Department of Hong Kong: In 2012, there were 9,278 tonnes of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) disposed of at landfills each day. Out of the MSW, about 3,337 tonnes (36%) were food waste, constituting the largest MSW category. The immense mass of food waste facilitates many complex issues.
Landfills in Hong Kong use a multitude of waste reduction mechanisms to reduce the impact of refuse. However, the most common waste reduction practice of biodegrading food waste is not sustainable and does not work well with Hong Kong’s limited landfill space. This is because it contributes to environmental issues by generating large amounts of water containing run-off materials from the landfill, which defiles the local environment by introducing toxins to the ecosystem .
If considered carefully, there are plenty of solutions to this problem. But ethically, what do we do? In Hong Kong, the Government created a food waste management strategy which reduces the amount of food waste and introduced a multi-step process to achieve this goal. Firstly, the most essential step is to prevent and reduce food waste at its source. These places include farms and processing factories. The main goal is to reduce the food waste, thereby reducing the issues related to it.
According to the Government Bureau, the second stage is to donate surplus food from excess production. The third stage is to recycle and to recover energy and nutrients from food. The fourth step is to transform the waste into energy using the MSW. Finally, the Government sets out to clean the landfills (Environmental Protection Department, 2019).
Even with these measures, a report conducted by local news source Apple Daily found out that out of 198 vendors from eighteen markets interviewed, 66% did not participate in the Government's Food Wise scheme. This low participation rate was due to unawareness or ignorance about the process of getting involved in the program (Sun, 2016).
As responsible citizens, we can undertake a plethora of beneficial actions. Competent staff in the hospitality industry could adopt a participatory approach in implementing control measures such as informing customers beforehand about food and waste that could occur . Penalties could be set for the restaurants if food waste exceeds a certain amount. If possible, shopkeepers could remind customers about the expiry date and the needed conditions for storage before purchasing something. Also, restaurants and markets could work with different types of charity groups to send food to charities for those that are in need.
Besides lifestyle changes, there are several NGOs across Hong Kong, one of which is Food Angel, a food rescue and assistance program launched during 2011 with a mission of “Waste Not, Hunger Not, With Love”. Their programme recycles edible surplus food from different sources of the food industry, which would otherwise be disposed of as waste. It follows strict food protocols where the/rescued food is prepared as nutritional hot meals in their central kitchens, which then get redistributed to serve the unprivileged communities in Hong Kong.
Feeding Hong Kong has been collecting surplus food from farms, distributors, manufacturers, and restaurants. Taking these foods into consideration rather than tossing it into landfills, they aim to redistribute it to local charities which benefits the community in an effective and environmentally friendly way. They also encourage citizens in Hong Kong to take part by participating in food drives to collect and distribute food from groups, volunteering for service activities like organising warehouses, bread runs, etc. Donations are also encouraged.
Overall, food waste is an ongoing problem occurring all around the world. We hope you will be inspired to take action this festive season, save our little blue planet and stop us fleeing to Mars! We are all in this together, so let's work together and try to eliminate food waste!
