กินกู้โลก

by Tristram Stuart, ปัญญา ชีวิน (Translator)

ตีแผ่ผลจากการกินทิ้งกินขว้างที่คุณต้องตะลึง

ตีแผ่ผลจากการ... "กินทิ้งกินขว้าง" ...ที่คุณต้องตะลึง เกษตรกร ผู้ผลิต ซูเปอร์มาร์เก็ต และผู้บริโภคใน...ทวีปอเมริกาเหนือ และ ยุโรป...ผลาญอาหารทิ้งกว่าครึ่ง เป็นปริมาณมากพอที่จะเลี้ยงผู้คนอดอยากหิวโหยทั่วโลกได้อย่างน้อย 3 รอบ ป่าไม้ถูกทำลายและก๊าซเรือนกระจกเกือบ 1 ใน 10 ปล่อยจากโลกตะวันตกเพื่อการเพาะปลูกพืชอาหารที่สูญเปล่าไม่ได้นำมาให้คนบริโภค อังกฤษ บรรดาซูเปอร์มาร์เก็ตและร้านอาหารต่างๆ นำอาหารที่มีสภาพดีไปทิ้งถังขยะหากขายไม่หมด เพียงเพราะเหตุผลทางการตลาด นั่นคือถ้านำไปบริจาคจะทำให้คนไม่ยอมซื้อสินค้าของตนเพราะจะรอรับบริจาค อีกทั้งไม่ยอมลดราคาเพราะเกรงว่าต่อไปคนจะรอซื้อแค่ช่วงลดราคา

การทิ้งถังขยะต้องแกะห่อหรือกล่องเพื่อให้อาหารสกปรก กินไม่ได้ เพราะเกรงว่าคนคุ้ยขยะจะนำไปกิน บางรายถึงกับใส่กุญแจถังขยะ บรรดาซูเปอร์มาร์เก็ตต่างทำสัญญาผูกขาดกับเกษตรกรโดยกำหนดรับซื้อเฉพาะพืช ผัก ผลไม้ ที่มีขนาดและรูปทรงสวยงาม ทำให้เกษตรกรต้องนำผลผลิตที่ไม่เข้าเกณฑ์ไปฝังกลบทิ้ง เนื่องจากซูเปอร์มาร์เก็ตห้ามไม่ให้นำผลผลิตเหล่านั้นไปขายในราคาถูกให้กับผู้ซื้อรายอื่น ญี่ปุ่น...ผู้คนนิยมกินอาหารสดใหม่เกินเหตุทำให้มีการทิ้งอาหารแต่ละปีไปนับล้านตัน สจ๊วต...ตีแผ่ให้เห็นตัวอย่างความฟุ่มเฟือยที่น่ารังเกียจ และนำเสนอนวัตกรรมและแนวทางที่น่าประทับใจในการทำให้ดีที่สุดจากสิ่งที่มีอยู่ กินกู้โลก...จะทำให้คุณอยากปรับเปลี่ยนพฤติกรรมการบริโภคเพื่อเห็นแก่เพื่อนมนุษย์...โลก...และสิ่งแวดล้อม!

Genres: Food, Nonfiction, Environment, Sustainability, Science, Economics, Politics

392 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Tristram Stuart is the winner of the international environmental award, The Sophie Prize 2011, for his fight against food waste. Following the critical success of Tristram’s first book, The Bloodless Revolution (2006), ‘a genuinely revelatory contribution to the history of human ideas’, Tristram has become a renowned campaigner, working in several countries to help improve the environmental and social impact of food production. His latest international prize-winning book, Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal (Penguin, 2009), revealed that Western countries waste up to half of their food, and that tackling this problem is one of the simplest ways of reducing pressure on the environment and on global food supplies. Tristram set up the Feeding the 5000 (www.feeding5k.org), the flagship event of a global food waste campaign where 5000 members of the public are given a free lunch using only ingredients that otherwise would have been wasted. Held twice in Trafalgar Square (2009 and 2011), the Feeding the 5000 team have now launched replica events and campaigns internationally, and has now been commissioned to work globally in partnership with the European Commission and the United Nations Environment Program. Tristram continues to work with a range of NGOs, governments, and private enterprises internationally to tackle the global food waste scandal.

Reviews

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a shocker of a book.

Tristram Stuart is a fireball campaigner. He's a freegan, someone who is happy to forage for free food in supermarket dumpsters. But he is also fantastically able. In 2011 he fed 5,000 people in London on food that would otherwise have gone to waste, and in 2014 he did the same thing with 6000 people in Brussels. He wants us all to wake up to the amount of food we are wasting - as individuals, farmers, food manufacturers and retail outlets. Our wanton behaviour with food is appalling. When I was a child, eons ago, there was a popular saying - "eat everything on your plate; there are people in the world who are starving". My contemporaries and I thought this was ridiculous.....but Tristram Stuart's book is all about lighting up this connection and making it real for us. There are people in the world who are starving, and our nit-pickiness and profligacy with food is making their plight much worse.

He discusses waste and other general abuses, all along the food chain:

Farmers who have to throw away or compost good crops which are too big, small or wonky for supermarket standards of perfection.

Meat, from animals which costs a fantastic amount to raise in terms of water and basic crops like wheat and soya. The amount of precious arable land that is given over to grow food for animals. And then we only eat the *best* bits - discarding offal, and other less popular body parts.

Fish, often taken from terribly depleted stocks, and it will only get worse. The need for dedicated areas where fish can breed, and replenish their stocks.

Supermarkets and other shops, which over-order and then just jettison the stock which isn't used, often to compost or anaerobic digesters, which are poor alternatives to landfill when you consider the actual value of the food that ends up going into them, and the number of people (even in developed countries), who need help with food. The amount of waste food that is syphoned off to food charities in America is slightly better than in Britain, but in both countries the standard is generally appalling. So much supermarket food is wasted.

The shoddy food recycling history of the UK, compared with places like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.

The food that goes to waste in developing countries, especially amongst farmers, due to poor infrastructure and lack of basic storage facilities etc.

Plus he is quite preachy about another issue....the great benefits of using excess food as pig swill, and the ways in which this can be achieved. In many countries, particularly the UK, we are anti-pig swill due to the origins of foot-and-mouth disease in this country, (the 2001 outbreak, when improperly-sterilized recycled meat was fed to farm animals, causing foot-and-mouth disease.) He argues that we could organise wholly meat-free swill for pigs. He sites the experiences of a wonderful company in Japan called Odakyu, which makes for exciting reading.

Generally, this book is quite a clunky read. Lots of statistics, which often don't seem in the same idiom, so it's difficult to make comparisons. But nevertheless it's something I would classify as a must read.

It ends with an excellent chapter detailing solutions. It addresses a host of different people and organisations in society. This is not just a book raising questions, it has lots of positive suggestions too.

I shall end with his list of suggestions for ordinary people..... things we can all do on a daily basis to improve food wastage

1) Write a shopping list so you can check exactly what you already have in your fridge or cupboards.

2) Avoid being seduced in the shops by marketing devices to make you buy things you aren't going to consume.

3) When cooking, measure portions to avoid preparing more than desired.

4) Use up leftovers. Take them to work for lunch the next day rather than buying sandwiches. Or re-heat and convert into new dishes the next day and save yourself the bother of cooking from scratch.

5) Buy the size of bread loaf the household will get through before it goes stale. Freeze surplus bread or turn it into breadcrumbs. Eat your crusts! If you don't like crusts, don't eat bread.

6) Potatoes, carrots, parsnips and other vegetables rarely need peeling, whether as chips, mash, roast, fried or boiled.

7) Treat "best-before" dates with extreme skepticism. They aren't telling you the food is harmful after this date. If it looks and smells fine - eat it! "Use-by" dates are generally calculated with wide margins of error, but do ensure that anything such as raw meat you decide to eat after its use-by date has been properly refridgerated and thoroughly cooked.

8) "Sell-by" dates: ignore them completely. They are irrelevant.

9) Eat less meat generally, but eat more offal.

10)Eat fish from well-managed stocks. Avoid eating fish threatened by over-fishing.

11) Home composting, wormeries - or separate organic bins for municipal collection, are better than throwing biodegradable waste like orange peel, or carrot tops into the bin for landfill.

12) But it is not virtuous to throw "food" - whole lemons, bananas or whatever - into a compost bin. The value of the compost is a tiny fraction of the resources that went into the growing the food and getting it into your home.

13) Children learn how to treat food from the earliest ages. Try and encourage children to finish the meals they have been served. Kids are also very open to being told where their food comes from. Tell them stories about the land and the people who grow their food, and it will help them appreciate its value.

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Tristram Stuart's website:
http://www.feeding5k.org/

An excellent talk he gave on TED. (Only 14 minutes long.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWC_z...

And a Guardian article about an app for sharing domestic food leftovers.

http://www.theguardian.com/sustainabl...

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having worked in food retail before I was very aware of the food waste problem going in, but quite possibly not the scale to which it was occurring. Tristram Stuart obviously has an agenda, and many of his stats are used for sensational purposed- especially as many of the stats were so broad they were essentially meaningless (what does 30%-90% actually mean?)

That being said I know I will be more aware of what I eat and buy. My lettuce is already in a jar of water in my fridge. I am now convinced that many of our concerns are related to overpopulation and the waste of food, rather than other, commonly emphasized problems.

A must read for anyone who is looking to make positive changes in their lives to support the world, but doesn't know where to start, its as easy as not wasting food.

[skein · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really fucking hate how Goodreads does not save my reviews if I spend too long writing them.

Shorter review: more substance! fewer unimaginable examples! (Quick, kids - draw me 275 tonnes of imperfect tomatoes rotting in the field!)
More guidance for the normal consumer! Less pretense that being a "fregan" is changing anything or is a viable choice for much of the world!
More focus on the human end of food waste (starvation)! Less focus on "gee, aren't corporations just awful"!

Also, the notes/bibliography/index took up almost 150 pages. For a book on waste, that seems ... excessive.

[Jerusha · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very thorough account of everywhere in the food creation process that could be improved. Fascinating, depressing, and not that surprising, unfortunately. Part non-fiction narrative, part academic research paper. I ended up skimming some chapters that felt repetitive, though they did represent different areas of problematic practices. The book was published in 2009 it’s already surprisingly out of date.

[Amy Layton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew that we had a waste problem, especially as a country, but I never knew just how bad.  I never knew how many restrictions there were for farmers to even be able to sell their food to markets, or the reasoning behind markets' manner of purchasing, selling, and wasting of so much food.  

The photographs that Stuart includes are absolutely breath-taking and stunning.  Not to mention, of course, horrifying.  To know that capitalism creates waste is one thing, but to see it is another.  

Stuart's analysis is spot on, and suggests a call to action to change both individual impacts (purchasing less food; eating what you have, not what you want) and institutional ones (tell your markets that you are okay with less-than-perfect fruits and veggies, buy directly from farmers).  He also offers what a less wasteful country may look like by taking a look at Japan, who deconstructs pre-packaged meals to turn into feed for livestock.  

There's so many layers here, and so many that I didn't even know about.  This was so informational, and I'm so glad to have this knowledge now.

Review cross-listed here!

[Adam · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really necessary read. This felt like a second volume of Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma, in the sense that this book serves as the conclusion of investigating our food systems. In Waste, Tristram Stuart explores waste from all parts of our food systems across multiple countries. His focus on the U.K. and then U.S.; two notoriously wasteful countries when it comes to food. In the first two parts of the book, he describes the various ways and stages in which we waste food as it moves from production to consumption. Most importantly, in part three, he offers doable suggestions for all levels of wasters: from industrial suppliers down to us the consumer.

[Lucy Mazalon | Shelf of Maz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has blown my mind. It should be compulsory reading for everyone. I wonder if the situation has improved at all in the decade since it was written - I am certainly inspired to do my own independent follow up research!

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stuart definitely shines a light, but a compelling read this was not.
Though many of the figures are now out of date it was not this that distracted, but the repetitive nature. The highlights for me were when Stuart told of his world travels to Pakistan, the Uighurs of China and India to see how they recuse food wastage.

[Omkar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every day hundreds of people around the world go to sleep with empty stomachs. True to its name, the book uncovers the global food scandal and gives us an insight into the food waste at each and every process in the global food industry. The book also underlines the fact that our craving for over stocking food is cause of deforestation, global warming and climatic changes. The author will leave you feeling guilty about every morsel that you have ever left on your plate in the past. This book highlights and enlightens you on how small improvements by us can ensure that every human being is fed. Now its up to us to follow the path that the author has advocated or suffer the consequences of our actions.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Waste was eye-opening in terms of how much food is wasted (primarily) in the developed world. The author takes us through the waste produced at every step of the process from farm to plate. He covers farming practices, harvest, processing, grocery store stocking, handling of overstock in restaurants and leftovers in family homes. One of the most shocking chapters is about fishing practices and how much sea life is destroyed in the pursuit of our most commonly eaten species. The author cites pages of statistics (some confusing, some contradictory and most broad estimates) that at least support the idea that there is plenty of food in our world and no reason for people to be hungry. Of course, although I do believe that there is plenty of food out there I don't necessarily agree with the author's occasionally overly-simplistic solutions to the problem. i.e. Let's stop eating as much meat so that the fields of grains used as animal feed can get sent to the developing world so they have plenty to eat. I wish it was that easy, but it really isn't. He does discuss some more realistic options such as enacting taxes to inhibit stores from throwing away perfectly edible food. Every person reading the book can help to solve the problem, but I did get the distinct feeling that the largest chunk of the problem is at the corporate and governmental level (no surprise there).

This book is very much UK centered. If you want to read a better book on the topic that is more American focused try American Wasteland by Jonathan Bloom. It was really well done, shorter and just as eye-opening.

Two things really bothered me about his arguments. One is that just giving grains to the developing world (or letting them keep the grains they grow) will solve all nutritional issues. What I disagree with most is that grains are sufficient nutrition. Yes, it will solve the gross deficiencies ad keep people from starving, but it isn't really "adequate nutrition" as the author declares more than once. There is also the major issue of food sovereignty and giving developing nations the means to produce their own highly nutritious food such as meat, eggs, dairy, vegetable and grains.

The second trap he falls into is how he handles the meat issue. He begins a chapter all about the great waste created by the meat industry, how many billions of acres of land is used to raise grains for animal feed, how much greenhouse gas is released by the industry, etc. All the facts he cites are true. He also adds a very important line in which he encourages people to cut back on their consumption of GRAIN-FED animals. And that is the last he distinguishes between CAFO animal raising and natural grass-fed practices. There is a lot of research and practice out there to support the fact that animals raised on grass in a healthy environment is more nutritious and adds to a healthy environment. Animals can be grazed on marginal land not appropriate for farming. There are even people in the world reversing desertification partly but using grazing animals! The author makes the mistake of so many others in treating animals raised in CAFOs as the only way to raise animals and therefore ALL animal products are destructive and unhealthy. I'd much rather see us giving developing nations the means to raise their own animals and reap the environmental and health benefits rather than just give them grains that will just keep them from starving. Expect for that one little line in the book the author basically denigrates the consumption of animal products (unless you want to eat the offal, which he encourages). It is definitely disappointing and misleading.

[Andres · Rating 5 out of 5]

Completely shocking book about the enormous amount of food that is thrown away, food that could have been consumed by the hungry (domestically or internationally), food that cost money and resources (the energy, water, time and additional money that went into planting, growing, harvesting, processing, packaging, and transporting it all) only to have it be thrown away.

The author covers how waste occurs at every step “from farm to fork”, how much of it occurs, who does the wasting, and why the waste happens (and continues to happen). Reasons for such wastage range from deeply rooted cultural defects in not appreciating the true value of food, to laws, rules, and regulations that are short-sighted in scope but long-ranging in their ability to hamper any real effort at reducing or utilizing the waste that does happen.

The author also covers the environmental impact of wasting food: greenhouse gases from rotting food, fossil fuels used to transport food that is never eaten, the deforestation that occurs to create more farmland to grow more food that will be wasted, the drain on resources to produce meat, and on and on.

Stuart lays out the problems and backs it up with lots of numbers and statistics. It can be mind-numbing at times, and it does focus on the United States and the United Kingdom for a lot of the figures, but there are plenty of other countries he covers as well, for different reasons (such as those countries that produce a lot of food but have it go to waste because they have no way to store it, or those that have managed to keep very little of their food waste from ending up in landfills).

Stuart also has possible solutions to all of the problems enumerated, but their feasibleness are in proportion to the size of the problem: the bigger the problem the more radical and difficult the solution will be to those who will have to accept and implement those changes.

If you read this book and don’t pause to think and reevaluate your own food habits, then you are definitely not part of the solution.

Some numbers about the book:
297 pgs of text
68 pgs of notes
49 pgs of bibliography
19 pgs of index
8 pgs of charts/maps
8 pgs of color photos

[After reading this book, I went on to read this book: same subject, just as interesting, but different POV and style.]

[Happyreader · Rating 4 out of 5]

My God!!! The sheer magnitude of the waste and its environmental impact is astounding!!! Makes me want to go into food systems work. From the supermarkets to the food manufacturers to the restaurants and consumers, so much waste all along the system. And every time food is thrown out, it's not just the food that's wasted, it's all the forests that were sacrificed for extra farm land, all the fossil fuels that were consumed to farm and transport the food, all the manpower, and other resources that are also wasted in addition to the added burden on our landfills and the decreased access to that food by other markets.

What depressed me the most was the incredible waste of fish and farm animals, the inability of developing countries to properly store crops, and the perfectly edible food being thrown out rather than being feed to people needing food.

What I loved was the chapter on swill and pigs (now I want to raise pigs à la Farm City)and the generosity and thriftiness of the Japanese family who feed him a gourmet meal that was multi-coursed, abundant and not wasteful (very mottainai).

One caution on this book is that a good deal of the examples are British and European and even the author concedes that US food waste issues are different from European food waste issues. For instance, he acknowledges that US supermarkets have better redistribution systems than UK supermarkets - yet we have a huge problem with wasteful supersized restaurant portions. I was uncomfortable when he talked about eating all your food. Some of my obese patients justify overeating by saying they don't want to waste food and I contend that it's just as wasteful to eat more than you need. He does discuss how the US food supply is approximately 3,900 calories/person while the world average is 2,800 calories/person.

Nominated for 2010 Food Writing awards by the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) and the James Beard Foundation, which are awarded in May. I hope the book wins and gains more US recognition.

[Chinchilla · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was already quite aware of the scale of food waste and most of its associated economic and environmental problems before I read this book. Still, this is a very comprehensive, well-researched book on European food waste situations and food disposal policies as of 2008. Tristram Stuart’s passion for reducing food waste and raising awareness is evident through his actions and writing. I especially enjoy how in depth Stuart tackles food waste issues at different levels from personal to household, from restaurants to retailers, from distributors to farmers and fishermen. I find it a very effective way to engage people into rethinking their own practices and the impacts their actions may have on the environment.

The only part of the book I thought was a little lacking was the cross-cultural reference. Stuart had travelled to the Middle-East and some coastal Asian countries while conducting research for this book. Personally, I wish he has expounded on the food waste situations in those countries in more detail since I do find this topic very interesting. (At the same time I am aware that it is already a very dense book packed with information.)

Stuart examines and proposes how food waste can be reduced at each stop from the source of food production all the way to the hands of consumers. Unfortunately, I wonder just how much difference can a few motivated individuals make? Food waste is as much as an institutional problem as a psychological problem, and neither can really be fixed. I feel that the only way for the government and individuals to take this problem seriously is if some kind of severe global economic instability occurs. Then, people would be forced into having to utilize all the resources they could gather. It is a shame that people are so ignorant and short-sighted today that perhaps World War Three is the only way to curb this infestation of over-consumerism and entitlement.

I think this is a very important book that everybody should read. It has been almost 10 years since this book was published. I wish Stuart would do a follow up on what the state of food waste is like now in 2017.

It’s definitely a 5-star book.

[Chris Walker · Rating 3 out of 5]

After getting over the fact that the author ate from garbage bins for several years without any apparent ill effects, I found this book to be a well researched and heartfelt treatise against food waste. While the wealth of statistics was soporific at bedtime, I found enough of interest to push through to the end, although I skipped the comprehensive appendix. The book is written from a British perspective, but there are common issues in Australia. The author, being a former pig farmer, would like to see the return of 'swill' - waste food of all sorts - to feed pigs and chickens, instead of grain because of the major environmental and economic impact of its production. However, with the public fear of foot and mouth and mad cow disease it seems unlikely that the British government will lift the ban. I assume the situation is the same in Australia. The fact that no food can be sent to landfill in some countries seems to have brought about a real change in behaviour. However, alternatives for dealing with waste food such as composting and anaerobic digester plants while providing a technological solution don't deal with the prevention of food waste in the first place. It seems we have lost the moral imperative not to waste food which is a pity but this may change if food prices continue to rise.

[Nicholas]

This is an area I'm interested in learning more about. The book has some eye-opening stats about food waste, and some good lessons to take forward personally and on a societal scale.

Key takeaways from the final chapter:

- As a consumer, avoid throwing away food by better planning out shopping trips and avoiding the allure of flashy marketing. Be conscience when cooking, and be willing to eat leftovers.

- Trust your nose for food freshness. Best-by dates are largely conservative and can encourage unnecessary waste.

- Governments should increase public awareness of the downsides of food waste, and enact restrictions on food producers and corporations to penalize waste. Increasing efficiency serves all ends of the market. Tax the waste of edible food.

- Avoid farm subsidies based on output, as that encourages surplus.

- waste reduction is best when following this hierarchy:
-- waste reduction
-- redistribution of surplus
-- livestock feeding
-- alternatives to landfill, such as compost

- Manufacturers, stores, and restaurants should optimize forecasting and better set expectations for food availability.

- Charge more for foods with a short shelf-life?

[Marcelv · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was somewhat aware of the topic, after having seen a German documentary/report and that, combined with this book, paints a grisly picture of how we deal with food.

Since i saw the before mentioned documentary, I wasn't disgusted by his freeganism. I can understand that some people have issues with that.

Back to the book. It clearly describes, based on facts and research, that a lot of food is simply wasted for no good reason. The author refrains from preaching but simply bombards you with data and also shows what we can do to improve the current situation.

A very important book and a topic which needs much more attention. I find it very brave that the author also mentions birth control as an additional topic in his "conclusion", hardly anyone dares to pose the question whether the world population should grow any larger.

This book is not an easy read and, in order to reach a larger audience, I'd recommend the author to create a DVD version. The book itself is already styled more or less as a set of reports, so it can easily be transformed in DVD format.

[Aleksandra Singer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stuart tackles the topic of food waste and makes a strong argument for its importance. I appreciate the way that he directly connects food waste to land use in other parts of the globe.

I also enjoyed his use of statistics and information on *why* the phenomenon happens. I was surprised that smaller stores waste more but unsurprised that people are actually terrible at determining how much they are wasting.

It was also good to read about the interaction between supermarkets and manufacturers and to realize the extent to which supermarkets may push waste up the food chain to manufacturers or down to the consumers (by encouraging them to buy more than they need.)

However, I was skeptical about some of his arguments. For instance, this line seemed recklessly naive: "If we stopped wasting so much food, perhaps all the resultant surplus would be equally distributed among the world's poor" (p. 294.) This is simply not a realistic idea.

Overall I enjoyed the book and learned some things. However, the tone did seem rather naive at times.

[Mary Mimouna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, but one of the most disturbing books I've ever read.

I have never been one to waste food and have always been upset at others who did so. But I had NO IDEA of the amount of food wastage in the entire industry. In rich, industrialized countries, it is estimated that out of the total food harvested (counting wastage at every level of production), 60% never makes it to consumers' mouths. This is not just vegetable waste; millions of animals are killed and then WASTED each year. It made me so angry and even sick to my stomach to read certain chapters of this book (not because the writing is disgusting in any way, but because of what people are doing).

There is also an excellent 15-minute TED talk on this subject by the author, Tristam Stewart, for anyone who is interested in a short version of what this is all about.

[Marc Buckley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tristram is an eloquent speaker and writer and in this work tells the scandal of food waste throughout the world. I have a discussion with him about his books and works on my Video & Audio Podcast Show Inside Ideas should you want to take a deeper dive into the updated life of this Food Waste expert.
https://youtu.be/yMoREqvJX9A

Or check out the links below:
https://www.innovatorsmag.com/ideas-t...
https://www.innovatorsmag.com/inside-...
https://medium.com/inside-ideas/trist...

[Michiel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stuart provides a straightforward message to decrease environmental impact an solve world hunger: waste less food. Similarly to 'Eating Animals', the thesis is both well-founded by numbers and interviews as well are personal. Very recommended for the ecological minded!

[Alexandros · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a great and a good indicator of how inefficient we are on managing our food system.

Some of the following facts are interesting,

Most importantly starting from the European uniformity rule on fruit and vegetables which is completely pointless and embarrassing.

Some supermarkets have their share when it comes to their contracts and agreements with suppliers. By using their purchasing power they are forcing their supplier not to redistribute their leftovers, they are also rejecting a great amount of food for cosmetic reasons and pushing though promotion unnecessary food to costumers.

I was also surprised to find out that following suggestion, if the proportion of farmers crop that went to the supermarket could increase by 5% there would be an increase on farmers profit by 60%, I am not sure about this number but even a number close to that is surprising.

From the other side people are wasting 1/3 of their food especially in western societies and in countries like Japan this problem is even greater. Culture plays a major role on that subject, training and the optimisation of the food system in general could not only help to create a more sustainable future but to cover the caloric deficit of malnutritioned people which is close to 250 calories each as well.

In addition on this book you will find interesting facts about the calorie to energy ratio of meat crops etc. it is important that this is an issue directly connected with deforestation.
Meat is one of the least efficient on this subject. Apparently meat is one of the main reasons why humans need to plant crops like soy to such an extend by cutting trees in country like Brazil to cover demand for animal feed when at the same time kitchen refuse and scraps of waste food mixed with water for feeding to pigs called swill is under-utilized all over the world.

Lack of fishing zones is also a big problem not only for fish population but the reason why fisherman from Somalia can not find fish any more given than European fleet fisherman are constantly violating their area. It was also incredible to find out that from the 187 million fish caught from European fleet the 117 million are thrown back.

Use by and best before date , grown lab meat and new age plant based meat are definitely steps towards the right direction but there is a lot of work to be done and deforestation still remains a huge problem.

Putting a price tag on carbon emissions, on inefficiencies and having a more accurate life cycle analysis process are key in my opinion.

I think Tristram Stuart is exceptional i like his culture his style his work what he represents. He should receiving much more attention and continue his exceptional work well done!

[Juliet Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This sobering insight into just how much food is wasted across the world is a must read for anyone who wants to do their bit to reduce food waste. The book is slightly out of date (2009) but many of the issues are still as urgent as when it was written.

It details how much food is wasted through the whole cycle from growing food through distributing it to retailers, the unsold food that is discarded by retailers and the food that is wasted by consumers. It also demonstrates how this waste puts pressure on rainforests and other valuable natural landscapes, and the impact on climate change. It is an interesting fact that the author has spent large periods of his life eating food that has been thrown away by supermarkets.

It's full of scandolous facts:


* if the amount of avoidable potato waste was halved in UK households it could potentially free up enough land to grow enough food to lift 1.2 million people out of hunger.

* supermarket standards in the West around shape and size force some farmers to lose up to a third of their harvest every year (though this is beginning to change with some supermarkets now offering 'strange shaped vegetables')

* some dolphin-friendly methods of fishing for tuna are actually responsible for killing large numbers of sharks and other sea creatures.

* in many countries including the UK, most offal (which includes nutritious and once valued items such as liver and kidneys) is thrown away

The book isn't all doom and gloom though, it explores solutions such as fishing equipment that is designed to avoid bycatch, going back to feeding pigs on swill, restaurants that offer incentives to customers to finish all their food, food sharing initiatives and ways on which supermarkets can fine tune their stocking rate.

In addition the author explores some of the evolutionary drivers behind our obsession with agricultural and other forms of surplus. It offers case studies of companies that are very efficient at reducing food waste, including one that sends its waste to a factory that makes high quality feedstock that the company then buys back for its own livestock. The book also explores differing attitudes to food waste across the world, focussing on Japan as being traditionally very efficient in avoiding waste.

You won't look at your food again after reading this book!

[Mark McTague · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yes, this is an "issue book," but far from being one that appeals only to certain populations with particular interests, this should appeal to everyone who a) prefers eating to not eating and b) prefers a habitable planet, and one that still has substantial forests, ocean life, and an atmosphere and climate that is not hostile to life. Food waste, the subject of this book, is far more than just "eat all your vegetables because kids are hungry in _____." Stuart shows precisely how food waste is connected to deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions (carbon dioxide and the far worse methane), hunger at home and abroad, groundwater depletion, and marine over-fishing, to name a few. Yes, it doesn't make for pleasant bedtime reading, but just as the Japanese people living around Fukushima power plant would have benefited from advance warning of the devastating tsunami that hit them in 2011, Stuart's book can be seen as advance warning of what may be coming our way if we don't stop wasting food. The scale of the waste, as this book makes painfully clear, is simply staggering, and the insanity of it all is mind-numbing. As citizens we all should read it if not to help create the groundswell of public opinion to begin to tackle the problem, then at least to reform our own habits. And if this sounds somewhat melodramatic, read the book. You'll see. And if you already know of the global scale and idiocy of food waste and feel hopeless, remember where paper, glass, and metal recycling was twenty years ago - a fringe movement for tree-huggers. Now? It's as mainstream as apple pie. Read this book. Your kids will thank you.

[Mikel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good read. Illustrates the scale of the phenomenon, and most importantly, goes beyond blaming the consumer. It examines the causes of food waste at all levels of the chain, from agriculture and manufacturing to retain and household consumption. It becomes clear that food waste is predominantly a corporate strategy to mantain profits. The price of food is so low that the cost of looking for alternative clients surpasses the revenue they would obtain from selling them. The biggest culprit is by far the supermarket chains. Their aesthetic standards result in millions of tons of food discarded by farmers. The key point that this is not done to please consumers; many would buy uglier food for cheaper, but supermarkets do not want to offer a cheaper tier of, say, potatoes because less poeple would buy the higher tier potatoes and they would lose money. The supermarkets' strict requirements on the timing and size of deliveries also result in massive food waste, and their large portion sizes simply outsource the waste to consumers. Finally, I also appreciated the book's link of food waste and global hunger. It is not about shipping moldy tomatoes to Somalia, but about diminishing the global prices of food by not reducing the demand of food through minimizing waste.
Overall it is not a groundbreaking read, but it is useful in articulating the mechanisms of food waste and providing evidence from interviews and ground work.
Since I was only interested in the logistics, I did not read the last part.

[Christine Kenney · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kudos to this author for dumpster diving, inventorying and living off their contents.
Chapter 18 on an action plan is a worthwhile. The preceding 17 chapters were repetitive but raised some interesting points. The claim I found least persuasive was that if the everyone has access to sufficient food, this will manifest in better environmental conservation. Wouldn't population growth once again leave some of us hungry?... but it is a comfort to know that there is slack everywhere in the food supply chain and we use this awareness to buffer shocks and geographic inequities.

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Apparently very thorough, as well as deeply discouraging, overview of international agriculture, production and commerce. It appears that not very much money would be required to revise the system and ensure that the entire world is and remains well-fed, while mitigating the effects of the climate crisis as well. This book was published ten years ago. The research must have been done some time prior. I am curious if anything has changed in the interim (hopefully for the better but possibly for the worse).

[Phillip · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 / 5.0

Interesting--Lots of Stats. Quite a bit of just so reasoning and topic drift. Points out a number unintended consequences of food production system and has some interesting insights in to incentives to waste food.

[Nuno · Rating 3 out of 5]

The topic is very relevant but it felt to me that there was a great concern with data - after a while it all felt the same and didn't have much impact anymore. I'd like to see the updated version of this book. Reading it 15 years on makes one curious about what progress has been achieved (if any).

[Marie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was not even able to bring myself to finish this. I agree...but I don´t and again and again. Waste of my time? I don´t know yet.

[Milton Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a fun book, but one that needs to be read.