How Businesses Help With the Problem of Food Waste

Food waste is a major problem throughout Australia. Food waste is the food that is not used and is thrown out. Each Australian household throws out 2.5 million tonnes of food that can be eaten every year. This means that 1 in every 5 shopping bags of food will end up not being used and thrown out. This food waste essay states there are many companies that are making a difference to help stop food waste. As well as charities that help people in need. Food waste is ruining our environment, this is because the food that is sent to landfill rots admitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

There are many businesses that help to reduce food waste. One business that helps to reduce food waste is Zambreros. Zambreros is a chain of mexican restaurants who work with Food Bank and have a program called Plate 4 Plate. When you buy muesli bars, brownies, sauces or packets of black rice Zambrero donates a meal to Food Bank. When a muesli bar is bought they donate breakfast including cereal and milk. They also work with Rise Against World Hunger and use their Plate 4 Plate program. When a burrito or bowl is purchased a meal is sent to someone who is in need of one. Rise Against Hunger, pack these meals and send them to different countries. Another company that is helping to eliminate food waste is Mcdonalds.They make their used coffee grounds into compost which is being used by lettuce farmers. Some Mcdonalds also have places for customers to take home the coffee grounds for their garden. In 2011 Mcdonalds became a partner of foodbank. They have donated over 550000kg of edible goods to distribution centres across Australia. Brae is a restaurant located in Birregurra Victoria that is known for being sustainable. Brae eliminates food waste by growing up to 90% of their own produce such as vegetables, stone fruit, citrus, nuts, berries, grain crops, olives, honey. They also get their meat from small and local farmers. As well as being self-sufficient with water as they have rain water tanks that can hold up to 160,000 litres. This water is then used for cooking, drinking, cleaning and irrigation of their plants. The food waste is put into a compost bin and then used in their gardens.

SecondBite is a non for profit organisation that is the leading national food rescue organisation. Second bite works with food suppliers to rescue fresh food from being thrown away and gives it to charities to distribute to people who are in need. Second Bite has distributed over 100 million meals. This reduces food waste as food is not being thrown away. Another non for profit organisation helping end food waste is Fareshare. Fareshare Rescues food from farmers, supermarkets, wholesalers and other businesses that would otherwise go to landfill and cook free nutritious meals for people who are in need. They cook a daily total of 12000 meals a day. They also have their own garden to help add to the meals. This helps ensure people that need it the most get food as well as reducing greenhouse pollution. Food rescue is another non for profit organisation that collects fresh food that is not sold and then gives it to homeless people. This helps to stop food waste as the food that is not sold is not thrown away but rather goes to someone in need.

In conclusion, there are many ways to help to stop food waste, like creating a shopping list, this way you are not over-buying Another way to limit the food waste is to use food that is going to expire first. You also can freeze food that is going to expire but has not been used. You can make things into dinners and freeze them and compost what you can not. This minimizes waste as the food not being used will eventually be eaten.