Tackling the Quiet Scandal: UK's Food Waste Crisis Exposed

A new report has exposed the UK's staggering food waste crisis, which is contributing to both social and environmental problems. According to the latest figures, an estimated 10.7 million tonnes of food valued at around £17bn is discarded each year across farms, factories, shops, restaurants, and homes. Shockingly, nearly half of this wasted food is still perfectly edible, representing millions of lost meals every day.

Beyond the financial and social impact, the environmental cost of this waste is profound. The discarded food produces around 18 million tonnes of greenhouse gases annually, undermining the UK's climate commitments and food security. Experts warn that this "quiet scandal" is one of the most overlooked drivers of the climate crisis.

The report's author, Taz Khan, founder of London's Community Kitchen, has spent 12 years intercepting surplus food and redistributing it to those in need. He has witnessed a system that actively incentivizes the destruction of otherwise good food, with farmers locked into contracts where it is cheaper to plow crops back into the soil than to harvest and distribute them. Supermarkets also continue to impose cosmetic standards that see edible produce rejected.

Tackling this crisis must be treated as a national priority, the report argues. With the UK hosting global climate talks and pledging net-zero emissions, addressing food waste could deliver emissions savings larger than grounding every plane on Earth. However, fewer than 15% of countries even mention food waste in their climate plans, a blind spot that borders on negligence.