Australian households throw $30 a week in the garbage: food survey

Australian households throw out around $30 worth of groceries every week, according to a national survey by PureProfile for the Feed Melbourne campaign.

The survey of 1,000 Australians found that 66 per cent of households throw out up to $30 worth of food each week, while another 34 per cent waste more than $30.

Households most often throw out food because it’s rotten, past its use-by-date or they overcook for the number of people eating. Commonly wasted items include left overs, vegetables, bread, fruit and milk.

“An enormous amount of food is wasted every year. In Victoria alone, more than 700,000 tonnes of food goes to landfill – the equivalent of 28,000 fully stocked supermarkets,” said food charity FareShare CEO Marcus Godinho.

“There is plenty of quality surplus food going to our tips, while we are seeing growing numbers of people going hungry.”

NSW and ACT the biggest wasters

New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory are the biggest food wasters according to the survey, with 38 per cent and 36 per cent of respondents admitting that they threw out more than $30 worth of food a week, compared to 34 per cent of Victorians and Queenslanders.

Tasmanians were the most waste conscious, at 20 per cent.

Money and the environment down the drain
Marcus says that wasted food is just money down the drain for families – many of which are struggling to make ends meet. “If you are throwing out around $30 worth of food every week, that’s $1,560 a year. I have come across quite a lot of families who could do a lot with that amount of money in the family budget.”

Marcus is not alone in thinking that food wastage is a waste of money. More than half of the people surveyed agreed that this was a concern(66%), but are less concerned that people may be going hungry (43%) or conscious of its environmental impact (33%).

“Food waste requires heavy use of water, electricity and petrol to be processed and transported to landfill, it also releases potent greenhouse gases.”

The survey found 56 per cent of people throw all their food waste into the garbage, while 44 per cent opt for alternative solutions, including using composts and worm farms or donating their food to charities.

About Feed Melbourne

Feed Melbourne, an initiative of FareShare and Leader Newspapers, highlights the issue of food wastage and insecurity in Australia. The campaign will raise money for food charities to collect, store and distribute food to people doing it tough in Victoria.

Editor-in-chief at Leader Newspapers, John Trevorrow said that the best thing Feed Melbourne can do is to help local charities increase their capacity.

“Donations to Feed Melbourne give charities a long-term solution by increasing their capacity to receive more food, hand out more meals and help thousands of Australian families put food on the table,” said Mr Trevorrow.

All of the money raised by Feed Melbourne will go to food charities to equip them with items such as vans, fridges and freezers to increase their ability to collect, store and distribute donated food.

Donations to Feed Melbourne can be made online at FeedMelbourne.org.au. in person at any Woolworths supermarket in Victoria or on: (03) 9008 0685.