Every informed observer agrees that food waste and loss must be reduced if we are to feed all humans. What’s stopping us?

In traditional societies, little to no food goes to waste. Every edible part of an animal or plant is utilised. Researchers found that the members of a Maasai cattle herding community in northern Tanzania were outraged at the thought of intentionally wasting food, calling those who would do so “lunatics”. Some even said it was worse than killing a person, because murder leads to one death, whereas wasting food could result in several.

Attitudes towards waste are very different in industrialised nations. The United Nations Environment Programme (Unep) estimates that 17% of total global food production is wasted and around the same amount lost, meaning that around a third of food produced is not consumed. The global average for household waste is 74kg per person annually, and this figure is broadly similar for lower-, middle- and high-income countries.