In a joint official declaration, the European Commission and the food industry shared their strategies for reaching the objective of halving food waste by 2020. The document, entitled “Every Crumb Counts”, was presented by FoodDrinkEurope, which represents the European food and beverage sector, together with the Europe’s Organization for Packaging and the Environment (Europen) and Federation of Food Banks.
While according to the most recent report issued by FAO, some 842 million people are afflicted by hunger in the world, with continually reduced resources, a third of food products around the globe are thrown away even when still edible. This is an intolerable waste, determined by production chain inefficiency, and in part by the scarce attention paid by consumers.
The European sector has indicated some solutions to try to turn things around. For example, agricultural and industrial processes need to be optimized, in addition to new package and distribution criteria. Loss and waste must be minimized, and it is necessary to recover waste for a number of uses, just like in the ever-hungry energy sector.
