FOOD WASTAGE- CAUSES AND MEASURES 

"For some a Snack, for some a Day's Meal ''

Food waste remains a significant issue which needs to be addressed urgently. Generally we define food waste as the food that has been knowingly discarded or destroyed, for eg- food discarded in factories, unsold food in restraunts or shops, kitchen scraps, and plate waste.

The causes of food waste and food loss differ in developing and developed countries. In developing countries it may include early harveting, inedequate market systems while in developed countries these reasons may vary, including excess food, bulk size packaging, etc.

Wasting tons of food causes huge economic loss for the countries and a lot of needless hunger, but there are some environmental issues also deeply connected to the problem of food waste.

• The carbon footprint of food produced but not consumed leads to production of greenhouse gases - making food wastage the third top GHG emitter. 
• Also many surveys show that produced but uneaten food occupies almost 1.4 billion hectares of land; representing nearly 30% the world's agriculture land area. 
• 54% of the world's food wastage occurs " upstream" during production, post harvest handling and storage, according to FAOs study.
•  About 46% of it happens "downstream", at the processing, distribution and consumption stages. 

  

  FOOD WASTE IS THE THIRD LARGEST GREENHOUSE GAS EMITTER

 With millions suffering from hunger and a growing population, technologies and working practices that reduce food waste and extend food shelf-life are critical areas of future innovation. We might not realise this but food wastes can be brought to a productive use by converting them to energy and fertilizer, by anearobic digestion which in turn can also be used to produce gas and electricity.

 In today's world technology and innovation are playing major role to reduce food wastage but it's now on us as citizens to be aware and to do whatever we can do to make this world free of hunger by sharing our food with the needy. To fight this problem, the world has to come together and make this wastage a bare minimum.

Please don't waste food- LIVE SIMPLY so that others may SIMPLY LIVE !

WRITTEN BY - YASHIKA
                          ( NET IMPACT MEMBER) 

CURATED BY- POOJAN SEHGAL