Love Food Hate Waste

The Love Food Hate Waste campaign launched on Thursday the 12th of March.  The campaign aims to bring the problem of household food waste out into the open and provide information to help Kiwis cut the waste. It highlights the importance of planning food purchases and meals, being smart about food storage and being creative with leftovers.

The campaign is being run by Councils nationwide and is based on research that included surveying 1,365 New Zealanders, examining the contents of 1,402 household rubbish bins and giving 100 families diaries to record food disposal for a week. Findings include:

•  It is estimated Kiwis spend $872 million a year on food that then gets thrown away uneaten.
•  We throw away over 122,547 tonnes of food a year – enough to feed around 262,917 people, or the population of the Bay of Plenty for 12 months.
• Bread, fruit and vegies, and meal leftovers are the most commonly discarded foods. The equivalent of 20 million loaves of bread is thrown into rubbish bins uneaten every year.
• The average household sends around 79 kg of edible food to landfills every year.
• Avoidable food waste costs the average household $563 a year.