UK supermarket giant Tesco has announced that it has reduced the amount of food wasted from operations by nearly a fifth, over a 12-month period. 44,297 tonnes of food were wasted in 2018/2019, which is 17 percent less than the previous period. The supermarket is now 81 percent of the way towards its target that no food safe for human consumption goes to waste.

They have achieved this by redistributing 63 percent more surplus food in 2018/2019 than 2017/2018 to charities, community groups, staff and firms which process it into animal feed. Tesco worked with redistribution platform, FareShare—donating to almost 7,000 charity and community groups. Furthermore, they have launched other initiatives such as “Tesco Community Cookery School With Jamie Oliver” to help these communities make the best use out of food received.

According the Food And Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, one third of food produced in the world for human consumption—approximately 1.3 billion tonnes, gets wasted every year which accounts to US$680 billion in industralised countries and US$310 billion in developing countries. In UK, 10.2 million tonnes of food are wasted every year, according to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

“Reducing food waste is a global challenge: one in nine people are going hungry whilst a third of the world’s food is wasted. This food waste has a huge environmental impact, creating unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions,” said Dave Lewis, Tesco CEO.

Further reading:

Food Cultures To Tackle Food Waste

Packaging Has A Key Role In Reducing Our Food Waste: An Australian Perspective

One Way That Supermarkets Of The Future Can Tackle The Scandal Of Food Waste