
Reducing food waste
Globally an estimated one third of all the food we produce is lost or wasted between farm and fork each year. That’s 1.3 billion tonnes of food that is never eaten.
Globally an estimated one third of all the food we produce is lost or wasted between farm and fork each year. That’s 1.3 billion tonnes of food that is never eaten.
Our Ministry has supported a number of initiatives to reduce food waste through the Waste Minimisation Fund (WMF). Some projects and organisations we have supported include:
The 2021 round for the WMF included investment signals for improved tools to avoid food waste and increased domestic capacity of existing food rescue organisations.
We sought expressions of interest from organisations interested in developing and delivering national programmes to reduce food waste.
We are seeking organisations to design, develop and deliver behaviour change programmes that reduce food waste. These may be existing or new programmes.
The programmes will aim to reduce food waste in three settings: households; Māori-led settings (such as marae, kōhango reo, kura kaupapa, papakāinga); and businesses.
The call for expressions of interest opened on 14 November and closed on 4 December.
Find out more about the programmes
Actions to address food and organic waste are part of the Government’s emissions reduction plan and upcoming new national strategy for waste.
We consulted on a proposal to separate food scraps from general waste for all businesses. The proposal was one of three we consulted on as part of the Transforming Recycling consultation. The consultation closed on 22 May.
Officials have analysed submissions for the three proposals. We received over 6,000 submissions from stakeholders including the general public, councils, NGOs, businesses and the beverage industry.
The summary of submissions is likely to be published in early 2023. It will include how many submissions were received for each proposal.
Read about the proposal: Separation of food scraps from general waste for all businesses
The Ministry for Social Development provides support for the food rescue sector through its Food Secure Communities programme.
In addition to funding local community food providers, the programme also helped to establish three national partner organisations:
The Ministry for Primary Industries administers the Food Act 2014. MPI has developed advice on:
These pages provide useful information on:
There are a large number of not-for-profit and community organisations active in reducing food waste, from food rescue organisations to waste educators.
They include: