Halving food waste could reduce climate change emissions and end malnutrition for 153 million people globally, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the United Nations food agency said in a joint report on Tuesday.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, around a third of the food produced for human consumption globally is lost or wasted – resulting in wasteful emissions and food shortages for people in need.
The report warns that by 2033, the number of calories lost between leaving farms and reaching stores and homes could more than double the number of calories currently consumed each year in low-income countries.
According to the report, doubling the amount of food wasted during its journey from farm to table “has the potential to reduce global agricultural greenhouse gas emissions by four percent by 2030 and reduce the number of undernourished people by 153 million.”
“This target is an extremely ambitious upper limit and will require large-scale changes by both the consumer and producer sides,” he said.
Agriculture, forestry and other land uses account for about a fifth of global human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.
UN countries have committed to cut per capita food waste by 50 percent by 2030 under the Sustainable Development Goals, but there is no global target for reducing food loss in the production supply chain.
According to the report, between 2021 and 2023, fruit and vegetables will account for more than half of all lost and wasted food, due to their highly perishable nature and relatively short shelf life.
In second place was grains, which accounted for more than a quarter of the food lost and wasted.
The FAO estimates that around 600 million people will face hunger in 2030.
“Measures to reduce food loss and waste could lead to significant increases in food consumption worldwide, as more food would be available and prices would be lower, ensuring greater access to food for lower-income populations,” the report says.
It says that halving food loss and waste by 2030 could increase food intake by 10 per cent in low-income countries, six per cent in lower-middle-income countries and four per cent in upper-middle-income countries.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)