Skip to main content

SA may suffer from food wastage, not insecurity

| Going green

South Africa should review the legislation regulating the use-by and sell-by dates of food, the Tiger Brands Foundation said.

“Is South Africa food insecure or do we have an acute case of food wastage?” the foundation asked. According to a report compiled by the World Wide Fund for Nature South Africa (WWF-SA), a third of all food in the country was not eaten but wasted. 

Quantified, this equalled 10 million tons of food annually, a third of the 31 million tons of food produced in South Africa every year. Of the wasted foods, 44percent comprised fruits and vegetables, 26 percent grains, 15 percent meats, and 13 percent was made up of roots, tubers, and oilseeds. 

A large proportion of this food wastage occurred both at production and retail levels. The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research estimated that a whopping R71.4 billion was lost to inedible food waste in 2013. The figure could be much higher today. Two years ago, South Africa was ranked 44th of 133 countries when it came to the affordability, availability, quality, and safety of food - based on the Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2017 Global Food Security Index report, the foundation said. “All of this food wastage occurs while an estimated 12 million South Africans go to bed hungry every night," foundation operations manager Karl Muller said. Supermarket chains have come under massive fire recently for discarding edible surplus food while a number of restaurant chains were loath to donate all uncooked or unused food supplies to others in need. 



Related Articles

Holiday must-have: New Kasi Kruza ride-on hits ...

South African toy manufacturer Hope Sonic’s brand-new Kasi Kruza ride-on motorbike, made almost entirely from recycled materials, is now available in Shoprite supermarkets nationwide. 

‘We can’t afford to wait’ – Shoprite Group inve...

The Shoprite Group has almost doubled the amount of renewable energy used in its operations to 103 234MWh (FY 2022: 54 138 MWh) over the past year.

SA consumers prefer paper packaging, want more ...

By: Retail Brief Africa The Paper Manufacturers Association of South Africa (PAMSA) enlisted South Africa as one of the 16 countries that participated in this year’s global ‘Trend Tracker Survey’. 

How to get R2,400 in Makro vouchers for electri...

By Hanno Labuschagne - MyBroadBand The E-Waste Recycling Authority (ERA) will be handing out vouchers on the spot for e-waste dropped off at Makro stores over the next two weekends.

Be water wise on your garden amidst water restr...

As South Africa faces water challenges brought on by seasonal climate changes - Rand Water and the South African Green Industries Council have called on industries and consumers to use water sparingly this season - climate change is affecting the ...