Over the weekend I had the opportunity to watch a really fantastic documentary detailing the proliferation of food waste globally. Wasted! The Story of Food Waste emphasizes the monstrosity of problems that stem from food waste, while also providing some solutions. The documentary features Anthony Bourdain, famed chef, journalist, and documentarian, who tragically passed away in 2018. His passion for food is clear, and he seems even more passionate about using food effectively and efficiently, providing many recipes using food scraps. The film provides many statistics about food waste, too. One third of all food that is produced is never eaten, and 90% of that food ends up in landfills. While that may not seem like a big deal given that food is compostable, a simple head of lettuce takes 25 years to decompose. Wasting food is similarly “financially stupid,” as the documentary points out, not just from a consumer-level, but amidst the backrdrop of serious socioeconomic challenges globally and environmental issues.
Other statistics the documentary includes are:
- The annual cost of food waste is 1 trillion dollars
- Food production is the single biggest cause of deforestation, the single biggest cause of water extraction, the single biggest cause of habitat loss and biodiversity loss
- 1.3 billions tons of food is wasted every year
- 800 million people are starving
I really enjoyed listening to chef Dan Barber speak about using food waste. He states in the film, “My first job as a chef is to cook tasty food,” which he does using all ingredients. While we often use all parts of an animal out of respect, we rarely do so when it comes to agriculture. 40% of Cauliflower, for example, is rejected–humans simply take what looks good and discard the remainder. Barber enjoys using the stems, leaves, and immature plants to make dishes, as its more meaningful and helpful.
Another chef, Danny Bowien, wants excess food to be fed to animals. He speaks about his travels to Japan where they passed a recycling law that diverts food headed for landfills to farms for animal feed.
Overall, I found this documentary extremely interesting and impactful, and it really reinforces my belief that there needs to be upheaval when it comes to food waste.