A group of leading food businesses has called on the UK government to require companies to publicly report their food waste data.
In an open letter to Defra secretary of state Steve Reed, coordinated by Too Good to Go and the British Retail Consortium, more than 30 businesses including Tesco, Nestlé, Compass Group and Bidfood argued that greater transparency over food waste would incentivise better behaviours and more efficient processes, and encourage more action to be taken across the whole industry.
Mandatory food waste reporting for large businesses was originally proposed by the Conservative government in its 2022 food strategy, however the policy was never enacted after flip-flopping from successive Defra ministers.
Creating a roadmap to move Britain to a zero waste economy has been named as one of Reed’s five priorities for his leadership of the department.
About a third of the food produced globally every year is wasted at a cost of almost £22bn annually to the UK economy.
“We are delighted to see the environment secretary set out the creation of a zero-waste economy as a priority,” Jamie Crummie, co-founder of Too Good to Go, told The Guardian. “In line with this ambition, and with the support of more than 30 businesses from across the food sector, we hope to see swift implementation of mandatory food waste reporting to ensure transparency and accountability when it comes to our food.”
Businesses are increasingly lending their weight to calls for greater transparency in reporting of key environmental and health metrics as sector leaders seek a level-playing field with laggards. Tesco, Iceland and Nomad Foods, along with three institutional investors, recently called for companies to be legally required to report on the percentage of revenue generated from sales of products high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS), as reported by the FT.
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