The agriculture ministry estimates 22 million tons of food get thrown out by consumers, restaurants and supermarkets each year in Japan. What are your thoughts on this?
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31 Comments
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0
TheNewZen
I would say much of it could be reduced/prevented. Also given the extra food to charities/homeless, etc would help. My Ward pays/reimburses a household up to 50.000Yen towards the purchase of a Composter. But a certain percentage of the food will always be waste.
I remember back home one year we had a bumper crop of Apples, lots were simple thrown away/buried as the farmers couldn't sell them. So some people went to the goverment and said ship them to africa to feed the starving.
Goverment said fine get us some 747 Cargo-jets within 3 days and distribute the apples within another 3~4 days before they are rotten.
Point being even with a lot of excess often it is not feasable to use the food.
0
serindipity
I can understand why so many tomatoes get wasted. They are over-ripe when you buy them and turn to mush within three days of purchase, which is the case with many vegetables in Japan. Also, I think a major contributor to food wastage is a misunderstanding of the 'use by date' and the 'best before date'. My wife is a shocker! Anything that is within 24 hours of either of these dates gets tossed as if it is poisoned.
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Nessie
Con.
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Nessie
A more interesting statistic would be to see which of these is the biggest waster.
0
Nessie
What's that in centiliters?
A more useful sting statistic would be to see this as a percentage of food purchased, since very few people can wrap their noodle around a figure of 22 million tons.
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Altria
Most restaurants and food-related businesses here don't even let staff take left over food home at the end of the day - they insist on throwing it out.
No idea why.
0
GW
I compost my leftovers, pretty easy to do some composting unless yr in an apt above ground floor.
Just imagine how high the number in Jpn wud jump without the relabelling scams we constantly hear of.
And as someone said above it wud be nice to be able to buy veggies prior to their peak freshness so you have more time to eat`em
The idea about using restaurant leftovers as pet food clearly isnt well thought out
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chardk1
Unless there is more of an explanation this statistic doesn't really give you any insight. It's like saying hundreds of thousands of Japanese people die every year. Yes, AND . . .?
0
TheNewZen
I myself got an organic semi-outdoor composter(electric). Lots of the kitchen type ones here are actually shredders that only reduce to 30~40% but are a bit cheaper.
Mine reduces to 10% and I get some lovely compost, very little smell(additive is available to cut smell further). Lives on the roof terrace next to the kitchen door, after meals just collect everything dump it in and it is done. Empty the overflow container once every 2 weeks.
So it is possible to get a good composer here for apartment use. And we think we all should do our own small share. May it be shopping wiser or making more meals using left-overs.
Japan has quiet a few good recipes for left-overs like okonomi-yaki, teppan-yaki, etc.
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Nessie
I live on the fifth floor. The window is my composter. ;)
0
NuckinFutz
With all the fudging of expiration dates going on in this country I can only see this as encouraging more illegal activities.
Why not just redo the catagories
"best if used by" "still tastes okay through" "might make you hurl after" "will kill the neigbors cat after"
0
kimigano
I think it's a meaningless statistic.
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pointofview
Wow! 22 million tons of food is thrown away and their are still millions starving. You
d think that with all these intelligent people/leaders in the world trying to be champions, theyd be able to come up with an idea or plan to transport a lot of this food to people who need it. What a joke! but more importantly a very sad story.0
cleo
Most restaurant food isn't fit for pets - too highly seasoned, containing onions and other toxic ingredients. I would never feed any of my dogs restaurant waste. (Though I will pocket left-over bread for them)
I veggie-shop once a week, and the co-op delivers mid-week. We eat the perishable stuff first, before it goes off. Tomatoes threatening to go soft get turned into sauce or otherwise used in cooking. Same for fruit. Almost anything can be turned into jam, even carrots. Most other things can be frozen for later use. Once or twice a week I cook more than we need, so that I can freeze two or three extra meals, to be eaten when we're too busy to cook. At the end of the week all left-over veggies ('cept onions etc) get chopped up and added to the weekly doggy stewpot, which is an occasion for much canine rejoicing and tail-wagging. About the only thing that ever gets thrown away is banana skins, onion skins and inedible seeds / stones. Tops'n'tails of carrots, cucumbers, spinach, melon skins, etc., all go to the dogs as treats.
Word has it that sometime next year we'll be able to rent a municipal allotment. When that happens I'll start composting the banana skins.
It's a sin to waste.
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chardk1
It costs money to send things places, exactly who will pay for that? Yes, in the abstract it is sad that food is being wasted but burning fossil fuel to collect and send leftover bentos or cabbages to some other neighborhood, let alone continent, doesn't alleviate waste, it compounds it. Also, there is no way to know from this stat how much of the waste is leftover perishables which one really can't do much with other than throw away. Reality can be harsh but that's not always someone's fault.
0
pointofview
chardk1
Of course it may cost some money to transport some of this food but who cares? People are more important than money. There are planes, trains, ships etc. going everywhere all the time. throw some food on those. Of course the entire 22 million tons can
t be eaten but Im sure there is plenty to fill some stomachs. By the way, tons and tons of money is wasted on providing food for those in need already because of inefficient politics so in the end it be beneficial to try and hand it out. There could also be pick up services available at the local shops.0
Nessie
Well done, Cleo.
Soup is another detour away from the bin. Keep a cup for drippings and you'll be in soup heaven in no time at all.
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Zenigata2
I wonder why nobody here would think about setting up a network of "food banks", just like "Second Harvest" in the US (http://www.secondharvest.org).
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archimech
Blah Blah Blah. Give the good stuff to the million cats you got around here. Nekochan say.....FEED ME! SERIOUSLY....cats need love too....;P
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some14some
these are old estimates, now restaurants and supermarkets have reduced their inventories to lowest possible level.
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borscht
It needn't be expensive to feed people with 22 million tons of food. There's a group in Boston and other cities called Second Helping who collect the food from restaurants, hotels, etc and give it to the homeless in Boston. They serve over 300,000 meals a year. I believe there's a Second Helping in New York, too. Volunteers collect the food and give it to groups who feed the homeless.
Url: http://www.gbfb.org/programs/SecondHelping.cfm
0
Richard_III
My thoughts on this are exactly: "so what?"
0
Taka313
My thoughts on this are that food getting thrown out is far less of an issue in Japan than their obsessive need to wrap ever single thing individually in a nice little non-biodegradable container. That drives me bonkers. I saw individually wrapped strawberries at the local Sakaya for cryin' out loud. C'mon!
Taka
0
chardk1
And if there is something the Japanese are famous for, it is volunteerism, public interest work and sympathy for the marginalized members of their society.
0
whynothow
DOSHYIO KANA??????
0
IchyaParadise
My thoughts on this are exactly: "so what?"
My sentiments exactly.
0
outofmydepth
22 million tons - now that is a crime. why isn`t this stuff getting to people who need it?
0
CaptDingleheimer
That number would probably go down if they'd allow diners to pack up and take home what they didn't eat. I imagine they don't want to be held responsible for the food once it's out of their hands, then catch a bunch of crap because someone got food poisoning from eating fish they left in their hot car for 7 hours after leaving the restaurant. Funny, restaurants in sue-happy America allow it. Restaurant portions in America are so huge, I'd hate to see figures our tonnage of wasted food if we DIDN'T allow people to take home doggy bags (though the portions in Japan are so small, I wonder who the hell there can't finish his dinner in one sitting).
0
hakujinsensei
Though new to Japan, the concept of foodbanking is spreading.
Kozmoz International operates a food bank in the Kansai area collecting foodstuffs from manufacturers and distributors and distributes it to orphanages, drug and alcohol rehabilitation center, DV crisis centers and of course homeless groups.
In spite of the all the glitter, Japan has a poverty rate of over 15 percent. That means that 1 out of 8 people you see today could benefit from that food. The ability to reduce that waste and put it to proper use to provide food security to those that need it is limited mainly by a lack of manpower. http://kozmoz.jp
To find out more information: http://kozmoz.jp/contact/kyoto-email Or to help the national food bank in Tokyo: http://2hj.org
0
Blue_Tiger
Its a symptom of the "throw away" and "self, self, self" culture. If I order it, and cannot eat it all, then I will not take it home, nor eat it later, because its not "fresh", like I wanted it when I forst got it.
Too bad, really...
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