Managing Food Loss – Why It’s Important • farmdoc daily

The issue of food loss is a concern at all stages of the supply chain, in developed and developing countries. Much discussion on the issue opens with a staggering statistic about the amount of food lost or wasted. Although the number provided can vary widely depending on the definition of food loss and the data used to measure it (for more, see discussions by Bellemare et al., 2017; Ellison, Muth & Golan, 2019), it is common to start with an estimate of food loss by weight (in pounds or tons). In some cases, food losses can also be reported, or framed, in value (dollar) or calorie (kcal) equivalents. In this article, we discuss the potential implications of how an individual or entity chooses to frame food loss.

An illustrative example: the USDA Loss-Adjusted Food Availability (LAFA) dataset

One of the most cited estimates of food loss in the United States is derived from the USDA LAFA data series. Using this data, Buzby, Wells and Hyman (2014) estimated that in 2010, 133 billion pounds of food (31% of the available food supply) was lost at the retail and consumer level. The authors then convert that number into retail dollar equivalents ($ 161.6 billion) and calories (141 trillion) for the year. Notably, the report by Buzby, Wells and Hyman (2014) is one of the few that can break down these estimates into product categories such as fruits, vegetables, grains, dairy products, etc. Figure 1 uses data from this report to show the distribution of food loss shares by product category in weight (pounds), value (retail dollar) and calorie (kcal) equivalents.

From Figure 1 we can see that the first two columns (shares of food loss in pounds and dollars) are comparable for most food categories. A notable exception is the meat, poultry and fish category, which accounts for a much larger share of food loss when estimated in dollars (30%) compared to pounds (11.5%). Conversely, cereals and added sugars and sweeteners represent larger shares of food losses when estimated in pounds versus dollars (13.9% versus 6.9% for cereals; 12.6% against 4.1% for added sugars and sweeteners).

The third column of the graph, which shows the shares of food loss in calorie equivalents, is quite different from the first two. While fruits and vegetables account for about 30% of food loss in pounds and dollars, the low-calorie nature of these foods means they only account for 6.7% of calories lost. Even more noticeable is the share of calories lost due to added fats and oils and added sugars and sweeteners. Together, these two product categories account for almost half (48.4%) of the calories lost. Grains also account for a larger share of calorie loss than they do in pounds or dollars.

So what?

When we talk about the extent of food loss, how we present that information matters. If we present food loss in pounds or dollars, for example, our recommendations to policy makers may be very different from if we are talking about food loss in calories. Researchers and advocates need to be especially careful when discussing calorie-equivalent food loss as a rationale for food recovery efforts. Yes, 141 trillion calories lost per year (a per capita loss of 1,249 calories per day) is unthinkable, But the quality of these calories must be taken into account. Almost half of the calories lost come from foods that are high in calories but low in nutrients (added fats and oils, added sugars, and sweeteners) that consumers are recommended to limit their intake of in the first place (Ellison and Prescott, 2021). Targeted food recovery efforts for nutrient-rich foods like fruits and vegetables are probably more desirable from a public health perspective.

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