Food waste research: Beef the most wasted food per household
The amount of money lost in food waste each year has been revealed. See how much — and what kind of food — is thrown away by Australian households.
It may be the most expensive red meat on the shelves, but consumers are throwing out more beef than other foods.
New research released this week by the Fight Food Waste Cooperative Research Centre shows beef, bread, cheese, and salad are the most thrown-out foods in Australian kitchens.
The Food Waste: Australian Household Attitudes and Behaviours National Benchmarking Study used online surveys, electronic kitchen diaries, audits of kerbside bins and focus groups to understand what is really happening with food waste.
FFW CRC chief executive Steven Lapidge said the average household throws away 219kg of food a year, which adds up to an average of $965 per person per year.
In an electronic diary kept by households, it found beef steak was the most wasted food by value per household, with 20 grams, or 60 cents per household per week wasted, followed by bread rolls, salad and cheese.
The electronic diary estimate of food waste found Victoria recorded the least food waste at 2.73kg per household per week and South Australia the highest at 3.05kg per household. The national average for estimated food waste in the electronic-diary is 2.89kg per household.
The electronic diary was a seven day detailed record of food disposed of by 1462 respondents, a sub-set of the benchmark sample of 2885.
“Looking into people’s bins as well as their minds identified not knowing what to do with leftovers is a major problem in Australia. Further, young people and families with children are likely to waste the most,” Dr Lapidge said.
The study shows there’s a lot of misunderstanding about food waste and a lack of knowledge about what to do.
“The research provides a detailed analysis of why people waste food, the challenges and barriers for them to reduce it.”
The study also found the reasons food was left uneaten included 18 per cent because household members don’t always finish their meal, 14 per cent was because too much food was cooked and 11 per cent was because food was stored for too long in the fridge or freezer.
The research aims to provide evidence to inform the project participants and other interested parties to assist with effectively targeting messaging, programs and interventions to change household behaviour to reduce and divert food waste
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