In a recent article on food waste by e-magazine, they cited that roughly one-third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year—approximately 1.3 billion tons—gets lost or wasted. This was based on the report, FAO report Global Food Losses and Food Waste, which was released May 2011. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found that Americans are responsible for most of this food waste—more than 34 million tons of food was tossed in the U.S. in 2009, which amounted to more than 14% of the nation’s total municipal solid waste stream. And only 3% of food scraps are recycled into compost—the remaining 97% is sent to landfills where it rarely decomposes and instead rots and produces harmful methane gas which contributes to global warming.
Here are top 5 tips you can do to reduce food waste in your home;
Create a Shopping List and Menu Plan: Plan out the week of meals and figure out how much you need to purchase for your family. You will reduce food waste by only buying what you need.
Make Smoothies: instead of throwing away wilted veggies or fruit, convert them into a smoothie. Go to Smoothie Recipes for some ideas.
Buy Only What You Need: consider purchasing in bulk, when possible, and only buy the quantities of food that you need. You can also freeze un-used fruit and vegetables and use them at a later time.
Compost: The best way not to feel guilty about throwing away unused food, is to compost it. Consider getting a home-based composter for your yard. Go to composters.com which has a broad range of composters plus information on how to get started.
Portion Control: Start with smaller portion helpings on plates and let each family member take more if they want. This is the quickest way to reduce food waste.
DIVE! is an excellent movie on food waste. Learn more about it on our past blog post DIVE!.
Imagine a grocery store with no packaged goods– no jars, no cans, no plastic packaging—just food. Well a new store opened in London that is just that, a store with no packaged goods called Unpackaged. Customers bring in their own reusable containers and have them weighed before shopping. Then, consumers fill up their containers with the products they need in only the amounts they desire. No more packaging to throw away, less food waste and no need to worry about the plastic BPA issue in your food.
According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, packaging waste contributes to about a 1/3 of our waste in our U.S. landfills. They also show that over 10.4 million tons of plastic packaging is thrown away annually by Americans. With 95% of the ecological damage of packaging is from the energy used and the toxins created in the package manufacturing and delivery process. If packaging waste could be reduced, it would be a considerable impact on our waste stream, energy use and toxins in our environment.
Earth Aid, is a software company that is helping consumers reduce their utility bills. The company recently named one of the Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in energy by Fast Company magazine, provides an incentive to members when they reduce energy to also accrue points. Customers establish an account on Earth Aid which is connected to a user’s utility information including power, water and gas companies. Available to U.S. customers in all 50 states, it is a great way for consumers to be mindful of resource conservation and get some free products from Starbucks and other local businesses.
For more information and articles about Earth Aid:
There are some great green apps now available that can help consumers make conscious choices on products and services and improve their green footprint. All these apps are free:
Find Green: This app provides a directory of green retail establishments in your area. It uses the GPS system on Android phones and can direct you to the nearest green establishment from where you are located.
Good Guide: An app that the developers have been working on for years and is very well regarded. You can scan the barcode of a product with your smartphone and it will provide you a sustainability ranking of that company and product.
Fooducate: An app that provides more information on ingredients and labels of food products. It has a rating scale and does offer alternative products that might be better or healthier for you.
Animal Free: Is able to help consumers know which ingredients contain animal products. This is useful for those individuals who want to be completely animal free.
Ecorio: This app also uses the GPS system on your smartphone to track your carbon footprint as you travel. Then, it also provides a quick way to purchase carbon offsets through Google.
PedNav: This is an app that helps plan the best route and transportation option with the activities of your day. It encourages walking and biking instead of a vehicle and helps route the best way to travel.
For a more extensive listing of Green Apps, see Treehuggers list of over 100 green apps.
As summer is now in full force with outdoor barbeques be mindful what you put on that grill! Veggie Burgers use a soy extraction uses a chemical called Hexane which is a known neurotoxin. An interesting article called, What’s in Your Veggie Burger, came out recently in E magazine about the chemical Hexane in Veggie Burgers. Also, Mother Jones put out an article, Which Veggie Burgers contain Neurotoxin, last year.
Here is a brief article on why Hexane is not very good for you published by Cancer to Wellness organization. And here is Cornucopia’s full report, Behind the Bean, that talks about the good and bad of the soybean industry.
Here is the list of non-Hexane Veggie Burgers verified by the Cornucopia Institute:
An interesting lawsuit has been announced between The Plastics Industry and Chico bags, a reuseable bag company based in California. In Green America’s announcement of this in Stand Up Against Big Plastic.
An interesting lawsuit has been announced between The Plastics Industry and Chico bags, a reuseable bag company based in California. According to Green America’s article Stand Up Against Big Plastic., the lawsuit is about ChicoBag’s claims that its products are superior to plastic bags with regard to environmental impact. There has been some debate around this topic of what is more environmentally friendly when you take into the account the entire lifecycle and manufacturing process of bags.
According to a academic paper on the plastic bag footprint, Plastic Grocery Bags: An Ecological Footprint, with extraction of the petroleum, the use of toxic chemicals and emissions during the manufacturing process and in particular the disposal and environmental issues around making the plastic bag adds up to some harmful impacts.
On the other side, some research has said that a cloth bag needs to be used 173 times to compare to a plastic bag environmental footprint. This is based on these reusable bags are made in China and use a higher amount of water and fertilizer in their production, along with the transportation footprint.
A report commissioned by the Environmental Agency of the UK was released in March 2011 called Life Cycle Assessment of Supermarket Carrier Bags, came to the conclusion that all multi-use bags- whether plastic, cotton or paper—need to be reused multiple times to reduce the environmental footprint. They also found that the biggest environmental footprint is resource use and manufacturing over the end of life impact.
As many environmentalists note the best case scenario is always to reduce and reuse as much as possible. The less we use disposable bags and the more we reuse the bags we have the better it is for the environment.
Natural Home Magazine had a interesting article, Building Better Community, in their April 2011 edition on how to revitalize neighborhood blocks and increase community. The article discusses the Better Block project as a movement to help communities rebuild neighborhoods and make them safer, entice local business economy and build community. They describe how citizens and individuals are taking the initiatives to begin in their own communities.
The Living City Block is another great project happening in Denver and Washington DC to help transform city areas into a sustainable communities where individuals can work, live and socialize.
Recently AmericanTowns launched GreenTowns.com, a new online network that connects green efforts happening in U.S. communities. Through GreenTowns, towns and cities can share and support sustainability efforts in their neighborhoods.
Superbia, a book written back in 2003 is another great resource in how to revitalize communities and neighborhoods.
Method, a green cleaning product manufacturer, came out with the “Dirty Ingredient” list which catalogs a list of toxic ingredients common in personal care and cleaning products. There are currently more than 85,000 synthetic chemicals registered for use in North America. Only 10% of them have been fully tested for their effects on human health and the environment. It is difficult to know about all of the harmful chemicals, toxins, and products in your office and home when you don’t necessarily see, feel, or even smell them.
Here are some other resources for choosing non-toxic and safe body care and cleaning products;
You can download a pocket guide from the Environmental Working Group called Shoppers Guide to Safe Cosmetics which is a quick list of ingredients to avoid.
Another good shopping guide from the Organic Consumers Association called Personal Care and Cleaning Products suggests brand name products to purchase that are safe and non-toxic.
Collin Beavan, star of environmental movie, No Impact Man, came out with his list of 42 ways to not make trash. Collin did a one year experiment of changing he and his families behaviors to a more green lifestyle that he profiles in No Impact Man. One of the goals was to be zero waste and he came pretty darn close!
The average American generates over 1,600 pounds of trash per year- more than twice the garbage of the average European. If all Americans recycled paper, plastic and glass bottles, and aluminum cans, this would divert over 51% of the waste in our current landfills. If all Americans composted food scraps and yard waste this would divert another 25%. Each American has the potential to divert over 75% of their current waste just through recycling and composting.
Companies are trying to do their part. A report by McKinsey and Company called Reducing Our Footprint found that global companies have already taken measures to reduce more than 1.5 billion pounds of packaging waste since 2005. However there is still room for a lot of improvement. According to research published by the Natural Resource Defense Council, annually, airlines throw away 9,000 tons of plastic, enough aluminum cans to build 58 Boeing 747 jets, and enough newspaper and magazines to cover a football field 230 meters deep.
Another great website to learn more about reducing waste is Reduce.org.
Have you seen the new U.S. Post Office Green Stamps? A great way to promote green initiatives is to add these to your business mailings. They promote 16 ways to ‘go green’ on a personal level. Although they promote some simple ideas, every little bit counts toward a greener environment.
In a recent article on food waste by e-magazine, they cited that roughly one-third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year—approximately 1.3 billion tons—gets lost or wasted. This was based on the report, FAO report Global Food Losses and Food Waste, which was released May 2011. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found that Americans are responsible for most of this food waste—more than 34 million tons of food was tossed in the U.S. in 2009, which amounted to more than 14% of the nation’s total municipal solid waste stream. And only 3% of food scraps are recycled into compost—the remaining 97% is sent to landfills where it rarely decomposes and instead rots and produces harmful methane gas which contributes to global warming.
Food, Waste Reduction | eco-officiency August 30, 2011 | 
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