I think that it is really important to not waste food. We can minimize the amount of waste there is by composting and recycling correctly. We can also minimize waste by making our portions a reasonable size for ourselves instead of getting huge servings and throwing away the food that we don't eat.

I agree with you Nicole. Especially in America, we waste a lot of food as compared to less fortunate countries. As a country we should be more aware of the portions we take.

yea why buy what you cant eat

its important to stop buying so much junk food and buy healthy  food grown locally

I agree ^

I agree with you that it is important not to waste food.  According to the United Nations Environment Program, one-third of all food produced in the world is wasted.  This meaning that 25% of all calories produced are not able to be consumed.  This is bad when over 800 million of the world's population is going hungry.  Yes, people can minimize the amount of food they waste, by taking smaller portions of food if they are not hungry, composting their food, and saving it for leftovers.

"Food waste." Environmental Encyclopedia. Gale, 2011. Science in Context. Web. 26 Sept. 2016.

I was surprised that food contributed the carbon foot print, because when I think of food, I think of things that are naturally occurring, like vegetables, grains, and animals, that therefore do not need to be developed or manufactured, for the most part, in a factory or other carbon producing manners.  Although, I now realize that food is often transported, by truck or plane, all over the country, everyday, to thousands of grocery stores. Then, those who buy the food often drive to supermarkets to buy the produce and then drive back home when they are done. This whole process in itself contributes to a large portion of our carbon footprint. This is something that I often do not think about or recognize because when I think of contributors to the carbon footprint, I mainly think of factories, cars, mining, or other processes. Additionally, much of our food is mass produced and packaged in unsustainable manners, further contributing to the increase of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. For example, when driving through the grapevine on your way to LA, one can see many co ws packed tightly together onto feed lots. The large herds of cattle are grouped together in preparation for slaughtering, so that the meat can be sold to satisfy the high demand of Americans' desire for meat. As a result, the large concentration of cows in the feedlot, creates a lot of greenhouse gases, especially methane. After the meat has been prepared, it is shipped off somewhere else in order to be bought by someone who will most likely drive to the store to buy it. Not only does the transportation of food add to our footprint, the large number of cattle does as well. Secondly, things like chips, crackers, and cookies are often times packaged in plastic or cellophane wrappers. After the cookies are produced in a factory, they are wrapped in packaging also produced in the factory. These two processes also add to our footprint.

In order to have cleaner dietary choices, we should buy more locally grown foods, to limit the amount of transportation involved in shipping it around. Also, people should try to eat less meat in order to decrease the amounts of greenhouse gases they produce, as about 56 billion animals were killed last year for consumption (animalequality.net).  Lastly, growing our own food is also a great way to reduce our footprint as transportation is mostly, if not all, eliminated and staying away from packaged products also reduces our footprint. I agree that reducing the amount of food we eat is an essential part of reducing our footprints. I think by creating laws on sustainable packaging and animal breeding regulation we can eliminate our carbon footprint. Additionally, if the law required wealthier countries not to consume so much food, we could also distribute the large amounts of excess to poorer, less developed countries, alleviating world hunger.

Dear Kristina- thanks for all of these thoughts!  I do want to point out though that the production is actually the biggest part of the footprints: the fertilizers, the fuel needed to run the equipment needed to work the land, the energy needed in processing meat, etc.  For meat, there is also a huge amount of methane produced from cows and pigs just in their digestion, and they take a LOT of land to grow the food for *them* to eat!.  So in my reading of the data, just going local isn't enough - to be sustainable we simply need to reduce our meat consumption.

best
Jason

I agree with the fact that we need to waste less food and have smaller portion sizes as well. In fact, according to Dr. Stephan Guyenet, over the past 40 years the average American calorie consumption has went from 2160 calories to 2673 calories, which is a 20-25% increase in calorie consumption. Also, the United States has much larger portion sizes when compared to the rest of the world, especially Asian countries, which leads to Americans wasting a lot more food and eating a lot more than necessary. Furthermore, if people begin to compost and recycle food properly as well as eating smaller portion sizes, then we will be able to have a positive impact on the world.

I completely agree. The amount of food we waste is appalling. About 1 out of 9 people in the world are starving,malnourished, or don't consume enough food to live an active and healthy life. If we wasted less food we could end or decrease world hunger by a huge margin. However, in America alone, more than 30% of the food supply is wasted. In an article from StopFoodWaste.ie, some of the major reasons of why we waste food are given to us. Leftovers, expired foods, and partially eaten foods are three big reasons why such a large percentage of our food is wasted.  Just simple things like taking a smaller portion size or only buying what you know you are going to eat will take us one step closer to ending world hunger. Also, a small food donation could make a big impact on someone's life. If we all find some ways to waste less food we are all making the world a better and happier place.
Source: http://www.stopfoodwaste.ie/food-we-was … aste-food/
Source: http://www.worldfooddayusa.org/food_waste_the_facts
Source: https://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats

I agree that food waste is a huge problem that the environment has to face. All this food is just thrown away adding to a constantly growing landfill. If this food that could be easily given to someone who can’t get food is just being thrown away, there is no point in making the food as it also increases the amount of carbon that is released. The main problem is when people throw away good food on their plates either because it is not particularly appetizing or they decide they don’t want more food and choose not to take a minute of their time to save the food for later. This pickiness causes so much food to go to waste and can easily be stopped since it is the result of a little discomfort. The concept of food waste is such a big deal but the thing is, it is also so easily able to be stopped. So much can be done but so little is getting done.

    If people just need a wake up call to how much food is being wasted, they can easily look it up and see all the facts. Did you know that three thousand tons of food are thrown away a day in New York City. However, New York isn’t   the only one wasting tons of food. New York City  is only one city, when there are thousands of more. In fact, the world throws away a third of the food made every day. In a year, that adds up to be 1.3 billion tons of food going to landfills. That weight equals the weight of 430,000 warships, the huge army ships you see in movies. To add, all this food waste totals up to be a huge part of the global carbon footprint with meat waste alone being 21% of the total global carbon footprint. With all this food being wasted, you have to make sure you don’t forget about the energy required to make the food. It takes 3.3 billion metric tons of carbon being pumped in the air in order to produce and transport the food we eat. The process of making our food plus the food that gets wasted adds up to be a huge part of the global carbon footprint. A lot of information can be found at fastcoexist.com where they share their idea on how to build a perfect city. They also share the ways we can help the environment by not wasting as much food.

    There is much that can be done about the food waste problem we face today. Many organizations have already made sure to reduce their food waste and the more organizations that follow will help tremendously. For example, in France, it is now a law that supermarkets cannot throw away food. They must donate the food to charities or food banks. Although, even with this step forward for France, all the food that is given to charities actually overwhelms them as there is still food that gets thrown away even after it goes to charities. That’s why other organizations like Les Confitures de Dominique take leftover food and reuse it to make jams, smoothies, chutneys, and soup. This system in France is a perfect way nations can try to reduce food waste but that isn’t something we can help with as students. The ways we can help prevent food waste can be very simple and can be a big help. First, when a family member goes to buy groceries, it’s a good idea to only buy the groceries you know you are going to use. The more you buy, the more likely you are going to throw out food. Another way we can help is by making sure to eat everything on our plates and that goes for little kids to. Even if you don’t particularly like a certain food, it hurts the environment more to throw it away than it would for you to just eat it and have a slight discomfort. Also, make sure to eat food in your house before it reaches it’s expiration date or gets moldy. All these little adjustments take that little bit of waste that gets thrown out every day and adds up quick reduces the total to very little. However, it might be harder for others to make these little changes to their everyday lives for their own personal reasons. It might be harder to not waste as much food but there is still something that can be done. Installing a in-sink food  waste shredder goes a long way. It takes leftover food scraps and turns it into a biogas that can be used as energy. In conclusion, the problem of food waste is growing bigger and bigger and if organizations and us, the people, work to prevent as much waste as possible, we can stop this problem.

I live in Guatemala, Centra America. This is a developing country, where a lot of people are in need. I don't agree that people should waste food. They can help by giving food away.