Eat Like A Londoner

The impact of food waste

In the UK we waste as much as 10 million tonnes of food a year, 70% of which is wasted in homes. Producing food requires vast amounts of natural resources. Globally the food system, including production, transport, and waste, generates 25-30% of all total greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing food waste is therefore one of the most important things we can do to help protect the environment.

Most people don't even realise they waste food, but in reality 30% of north London's waste is made up of food. On average 1 in 5 bags of food we buy is wasted, which wastes an awful lot of money too. Therefore, by reducing your household food waste you could save you up to £800 or 140 meals per year.

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How many of these foodstuffs are wasted DAILY in the UK? 5.8m potatoes, 24m slices of bread, 0.5m bags of salad leaves, 5.8m glasses of milk, 1.4 edible bananas

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Every day in the UK we waste 5.8 million whole potatoes; 24 million slices of bread; 1.4 million edible bananas; 5.8 million glasses of milk; 0.5 million bags of salad leaves.

Eat Like a Londoner 

NLWA is part of the London-wide Eat Like a Londoner campaign which helps people to tackle food waste in their homes. Head over to their website for low-waste recipe inspiration, tip, tricks and many more like the advice they give below!

How to reduce your food waste:

  1. Take note of how much food waste you produce - monitoring your food waste at home will help you identify how much waste you have, what foodstuffs you throw away the most, and whether your actions to reduce it are successful
  2. Meal planning will help your food shop go further (build in some flex for plans changing)
  3. Check your shelf before you shop – write a shopping list or take a photo of your fridge or cupboard before you leave, only buy what you need (avoid impulse buys or special offers)
  4. Store foods you tend to waste in the freezer - freeze bread when it’s fresh to toast straight from the freezer, also meat, fresh produce and dairy too
  5. Organise your fridge and know what is there, put all your foods that need to be eaten first on a dedicated shelf- use a sticker to help you
  6. Measure out your quantities (especially pasta and rice) before cooking. Only cook what you need
  7. Tupperwear at the ready - Box up your leftovers to eat the next day
  8. Save the stalks and peels too – find recipes to use up your scraps
  9. Have a leftovers day – find recipes to use up your leftovers
  10. Best before means it’s still great after - Ignore best before dates on packaging and trust your sense before you make decision to throw food away

As part of our commitment to delivering our Waste Prevention Plan, we have developed an outreach programme to compliment the Eat Like a Londoner movement. Find out whether a Bin Less, Save More food waste reduction workshop (including a cooking demonstration!) is happening near you on our events page.

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