Reducing food waste constitutes a priority, globally, for environmental protection and social welfare. The scientific study ‘Food wastage. Systemic approach and structural prevention‘ – published in ResarchGate and captured in the Technical Report of theISPRA (Superior Institute for Environmental Protection and Research)-analyzes the phenomenon with a systems approach. (1) Offering a set of proposals on how to address the current ecological and social crisis.
The
food chains
as a whole need to be radically transformed, as it is not enough to reduce food waste, but to rethink all the processes that generate other forms of waste. Which include, among others,
overeating and malnutrition
(surplus and deficit), non-food uses of edible agricultural commodities (Ex. biofuels), net losses related to the feeding of farm animals with human edibles.
Food waste, a systemic problem
The
food waste
, in a systemic view, is among the prime causes of overcoming ecological and social limits of
resilience
and stability of the planet. In fact, the vicious cycle of surplus and waste is associated with
greenhouse gas emissions
and climate change, loss and alteration of biodiversity
à
(genes, species and habitats),
overconsumption and pollution of water, soil and other natural resources (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium cycles).
The overproduction of surpluses Is the leading cause of waste globally. In fact, each increase in requirements (+0.1%) corresponds to a increase far greater than bids and consumption (about +1.0%), which in turn triggers exponential increases in wasted surplus (+3.2%). A spiral that accentuates inequality, exposing to malnutrition and related diseases
two out of three people
at the planetary level. Increasing undernutrition (830 million people), overweight (excess calories and deficiency of some nutrients: nearly 2 billion, including 600 million who are obese) and those who are subject to
various other types of malnutrition
(sufficient calories, but insufficient nutrients, about 2 billion).
Wasting affects
at least 44% of calories (even 85% where all forms of waste are considered), 50% in mass and 66% in
protein
and produced by the global food supply chain. This corresponds to an ecological footprint that disperses about 32 percent of the natural resources generated each year (biocapacity). In Italy overall waste reaches 63%, with dispersion of about 50% of resources that are, among other things, largely generated elsewhere (think North American wheat, rather than
soybean
and corn
used in animal feed).
The processing needs of the food supply chain
Food production
– especially in intensive, industrial and financialized models-is the phase of supply chains with the greatest impact
environmental
e. Far more than the final stage, that of food waste disposal. Thus, we need to revise models that are flawed by abuses of energy consumption (mostly from fossil sources) and synthetic chemicals, in a market dominated by global finance that tends to stimulate the relative lowering of consumer food prices in developed countries (thus promoting increased waste at the consumption stage). Conversely, the dependence on the international market of the
commodities
(reinforced by overproduction wastage) tends to affect the relative rise in consumer food prices in lower and middle-income countries, generating vulnerability and food insecurity.
The scientific evidence show how environmental protection and ‘food security‘
(i.e., food supply security) cannot be separated from the self-sufficiency of countries (which in Italy is
likely only at about 55%.
) and their cooperation. This involves reducing agricultural and natural land consumption, reclaiming rural land, and converting production toward
ecological agriculture
and
extensive
, respecting biodiversity. Therefore, the scientific principles of ecology should be applied to agriculture, valuing
the social demands
of workers and local communities, to achieve the c.d. sovereigntyà food.
Enhancing biodiversity.à agribusiness (with varietyà local and traditional, participatory improvements) means reducing the footprint ambientaland agricultural production, foster resilience (and thus adaptation to climate change),
return centrality to farmers
and local populations, ensure in the medium to long term the health of citizens and the economic sustainability of supply chains. In parità of resources used, small-scale ecological agriculture generates 2-4 times less waste than agro-industrial systems and consumes far fewer resources overall. In addition to providing more nutrients and being more durable, due to less dependence on international markets of commodities standardized. Globally, small-scale agriculture produces 70 percent of the total with 25 percent of the land.
This transformation requires structural action to reduce food waste in its various forms. The net losses inherent in feeding and raising farm animals today represent the largest component of waste, affecting about 40 percent of primary edible production in Italy. Therefore, it is necessary to direct the population’s diet toward greater consumption of plant products, reducing those of foods of animal origin as well as high-calorie and over-processed products(unhealthy fats, sugars and salt). They also go
reduced total population needs (with shared family planning and sexual care/education), commercial oversupply and overconsumption.
In short, higher quality and lower quantity
à
of foods.
Structural prevention
The research analyzes the
conventional food supply chains and their ‘
bottlenecks
‘ (bottlenecks, areas of market concentration) and highlights the possibility of reducing food waste by favoring other types of models. In fact, it emerges that short, regional and organic supply chains (direct farm sales, farmers’ markets and stores, home even online) produce on average 3 times less food waste, compared to conventional systems. In cases of innovations coming from the societyà civil, based on local agroecological production and Solidarity Economy networks between farmers and consumers (e.g. Purchasing Groups Solidal, GAS; CSA community-supported agriculture) waste can be 8 times less on average. Those who source only through alternative distribution networks wastes mediamind one-tenth of those who source from large-scale retail trade (GDO). Overall, the environmental and social performance of alternative food systems is much more effective. Solidarity networks act positively on all fronts of waste. Reducing intermediation improves the coordinatesments between natural resource management, production, consumption and needs. Due to the significant increase in awareness of the values of food, fair remuneration of producers and more effective management of the few leftovers is ensured.
|
Performance |
Industrial food systems |
Systems with short, local, organic supply chains |
Local, small-scale agroecological systems with solidarity networks |
|
Food waste (% of output) |
40 – 60 |
15 – 25 |
5 – 10 |
|
(% compared to industrial systems) |
100% |
200 – 400 |
400 – 1.200 |
The study proposes a set of structural preventive measures potentially suitable for addressing the problems under consideration, through environmental and food policies appropriate to the objectives. Prevention is the cornerstone of a strategy that starts with an overall food policy (food policy) declined on several sectoral and territorial levels, referring to planning for sustainable food models of production, distribution and consumption. Public administrations must provide food and nutrition education, buy sustainable food (green public purchasing, GPP), support local, small-scale, ecological, solidarity food networks. Agroecology should be promoted with the enhancement of agrobiodiversity.à, protection of peasant agriculture and access to land, deepen research, and encourage social, urban and inland rural areas subject to depopulation. It is also necessary to
contrast
are all forms of malfeasance in food supply chains and encourage the active role of citizens to create community networks
à
resilient.
The
bioeconomies
of recovery (an area in which Italy is at the forefront thanks to Law 166/2016), efficiency and recycling
must, in turn, be put in place to foster a tendentially circular economy that operates only with quantities
à
‘
physiological
‘ of surpluses produced from their own territory. Indeed, the quasi-circular bioeconomy should maintain a secondary role to the priority of preventing surplus production through the development of ecological, solidarity-based, local and small-scale food networks. This is so as to avoid the
paradoss
o need more surpluses, impacts and resource consumption to maintain these new processes.
The ethical value of food and the necessary ecological and solidarity-based transformation
The
sprec
hi food
still in place prove in many ways to be functional for the expansion of an economic and commercial system driven by liberalist and financial logics incompatible with natural limits (already overcome). A system that increasingly distances production from consumption, dominated by the few, fictitious capital and its speculative bubbles
, from international trade, concentration of markets (bottlenecks where large players condition small suppliers and consumers), standardization of product standards (driven by showmanship and commoditization), unfair practices in trade and labor markets
, food fraud
. The environmental and social costs of unsustainable production are still being externalized and concealed, lowering prices and thus encouraging wasteful consumption. However, citizens are beginning to respond with invincible pressure from below
To regain physical, economic and cognitive control
of the supply chain.
Structural prevention deve pursue the goal main to reduce waste in Italy to no more than 25 percent of current levels and thus restore the food system to the conditions of security. The right to
food
vainly proclaimed by the United Nations, must find concrete implementation through policies for food self-sufficiency that recognize the ecological and social system of food as a vital collective good.
As a result, funding for military spending, fossil fuels and agribusiness
, for example,
must be at least partly transferred to communities
à
local self-sustainable places that practice Solidarity Economy by cooperating with each other on an equal basis at a global scale. We need to redefine the foundation of democracy, starting with basic human rights and duties that are still seriously neglected. All of this can increase humanity’s resilience in the face of the very serious risks that are beginning to manifest.
#Égalité!
Giulio Vulcano and Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) Cf. Julius Vulcan (2018), ‘Food wastage. Systemic approach and structural prevention‘. doi 10.13140/RG.2.2.28470.40001/4. Full text on ResearchGate,
See the ISPRA technical report
Researcher in ecology and agriculture, he works at ISPRA (Higher Institute of Environmental Protection and Research). He has extensive experience of grassroots social and environmental innovation networks and paths.
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
