Opinion: Tesco’s change shouldn’t end on the fruit and veg aisle
BY Stephen Butchard
MY girlfriend and I have had one serious argument in the five years we’ve been together, and it was over some onions. Perfectly fresh onions, I will add. Sure, they might have had a tougher skin than normal, but they’d be great in a soup. My partner wasn’t sure. She picked up the packet, let out a snort, and threw them in the bin. “I knew it. Best before yesterday”, she said.
That’s when it all kicked off. We’d been in this position before. Half a bag of spinach carelessly thrown out. Strawberries lost because of one squishy one. Cheese never to lay on toast because of a ‘consume within three days’ label. But onions? Only a best before? No use by? Something had to be done. After arguing about the semantics of the classification, and the lack of health risks associated with consuming a semi-dodgy onion, we decided to separate our food shops for a week. No shallot was going wasted under my watch. It would have broken us if it didn’t also mean she could live on bean burgers and I was free to buy Stilton.
To be fair to my veg murdering girlfriend, many don’t understand the meaning behind a best before. A poll conducted by the National Federation of Women’s Institutes (NFWI) found that less than half of people asked knew what the label meant. For clarity, it indicates that food might not be at its optimum quality, but is still safe to eat. The danger creeps in at a use by date, but as someone who grew up in a household that would happily tuck into a mouldy loaf as long as you cut the blue off, it feels like it’s there so companies don’t get sued more than anything else.
We’re removing Best Before dates from nearly 70 fruit and veg products to help reduce #foodwaste #notimeforwaste
— Tesco News (@tesconews) May 21, 2018
But the tide is turning. Earlier this week, Tesco announced that it would be doing away with the advice on about 70 pre-packaged produce lines to avoid “perfectly edible food” being thrown away. Apples, potatoes, tomatoes, lemons, and – ahem – onions, will all lose the label thanks to the decision. Tesco’s head of food waste Mark Little said that the company made the change to fruit and vegetable packaging as they are among the most wasted foods. He added that many customers had told the company that they already judge their produce by the look rather than trusting a date. You go, Mark.
Tesco should be commended for the steps they’re taking to reduce food waste as a company, and this isn’t the only thing they’ve done to minimise their waste this month. Just last week, they announced a new range of affordable smoothies made with misshapen veg that would likely be thrown out otherwise. Not only is this a genius piece of marketing for a company that’s been struggling for the past few years, but it’s an essential step in reducing our carbon footprint and depressing landfill culture. More supermarkets need to be encouraged to do the same.
Food waste is one our countries quiet shames. Research from WRAP found that estimated annual food waste in UK households, hospitality, food manufacture, wholesale sectors sits around 10 million tonnes, 60% of which could have been avoided. (By avoidable, researchers clarify that they don’t mean your cold leftover chow mein from last night. They mean high quality food that has far from perished.) This will have led to 20 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, with a value of over £17 billion a year. What’s even more saddening is that around 85% of the avoidable food waste comes from households and food manufacture, though these parts of the food chain certainly influenced each other.
A good step toward reducing unnecessary food waste – @Tesco is removing best before dates on fresh produce to help stop perfectly edible food from being discarded. 💚🍎 https://t.co/nvRs9dIkm8
— Keep Britain Tidy (@KeepBritainTidy) May 22, 2018
Those figures are enough to want to put humanity in the bin, but there are glimmers of hope. Senior scientist for the Natural Resources Defence Council Dana Gunders says that “a lot of the waste in our society does come down to choice and wanting to have the option to eat something at any time whether or not we use it.” Work by her peers and the other institutes suggests that removing this choice could drastically cut down on the food we waste. The raw truth is that humans are bad at managing this waste individually. Widespread social changes are needed to minimise this current trend.
Take dinner plates for example. Research from Wansink and Van Ittershum found that the average plate used in households has risen by 36% since the 1960’s. The size of are portions, and the amount we waste per portion has risen alongside it. Their research found that by reducing the amount of white space on a plate, consumers wasted less overall without going hungry.
Cynics might say that Tesco’s efforts are a marketing ploy, and they’re probably right. It’s unlikely that the company have been using the prettiest carrots they could find in their smoothies up until now. But it’s clear that our shift away from wasting food is as much cultural as it is logistical, and having a nationally recognised brand flying the flag for such an important cause will only add to the public consciousness.
We’re not going to solve our waste problems with changes to labeling. It would be even better to see Tesco getting rid of the plastic around that veg like the Dutch company Ekoplaza did in their bold opening earlier this year; UK Supermarkets along are still responsible for producing over one million tonnes of plastic, which is harming our environment at a more obvious way than food waste. But what Tesco have done is still an enormous change, that required a few back spaces on a keyboard to accomplish. It’s a reminder that in the fight to reduce food waste, we can take things one store, one plate and one onion at a time.
