久久亚洲国产成人影院-久久亚洲国产的中文-久久亚洲国产高清-久久亚洲国产精品-亚洲图片偷拍自拍-亚洲图色视频

USEUROPEAFRICAASIA 中文雙語Fran?ais
Lifestyle
Home / Lifestyle / Food

Keep a kitchen diary and prevent waste

By Derk Byvanck | China Daily | Updated: 2013-03-06 09:07

Keep a kitchen diary and prevent waste

All of us should keep a kitchen diary, showing how much food leaves our home uneaten, as garbage. We all waste food, you and me, every day, millions of tons of it. In China, enough food is wasted in restaurants every year to feed 200 million people. In the United States, 40 percent of food is wasted from farm to fork. Each year, the amount of food thrown away in rich countries is almost the same as that produced in sub-Saharan Africa. This raises some important questions.

In developing countries, food is lost because farmers do not have appropriate cooling, storage or market access for their crops. Their grains, fruits and vegetables wither and rot away. In developed countries, the picture is different, and food is wasted in supermarkets, restaurants and at home. China faces both syndromes, significant losses in farms, as well as at the retail and consumption stages. And the amount of food wasted by Chinese consumers is rapidly increasing.

In China, which didn't have a supermarket until 1989, annual supermarket sales have reached $100 billion today. The country will soon become the biggest consumer market in the world.

Consumer culture has pervaded China and urban residents can get quality food from anywhere in the country and from across the planet. Chinese consumers are as picky about their food as their counterparts in other countries. In supermarkets, they refuse to buy vegetables that don't look fresh or have an irregular shape, or milk and other products close to their expiry date.

Besides, Chinese consumers tend to be generous. In restaurants or at home, often too much food is ordered or cooked and served. So while trooping out of a restaurant, full and happy, with colleagues or friends, look back at what's left untouched on the table. Should Chinese consumers take more responsibility for the waste they create?

Everyone deserves to have enough food to eat. Despite China's impressive success in reducing hunger over the past three decades, the job is not complete yet. Food security and diets in Chinese cities are way better than in its rural areas. About 12 percent of Chinese people are still undernourished, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, which in itself is enough reason not to waste food. And there is more.

The world produces enough food to feed everyone on the planet. But the increasing demand and changed diets (more meat) threaten to exhaust the planet's natural resources, such as freshwater and land, and then there is climate change.

Mind you, the gasses emitted during food production are estimated to account for about 29 percent of the total gasses that are heating up our planet, probably much more. Livestock for our plate alone emits more greenhouse gasses (GHG) in carbon equivalents than cars, in the form of manure and digestive gasses, and more if land use is fully accounted for. The disposal of food waste is not just a lot of dirty and expensive work in big cities. Food waste is usually burned or dumped, contributing to climate change. Scientists say the 360,000 tons of milk wasted in the United Kingdom annually creates GHG emissions equivalent to 20,000 cars.

So what should Chinese consumers do? The most obvious thing for them to do is to stop throwing away food that is still edible. They should eat everything they buy and if they cannot, they should buy less. They should ask for smaller portions in stores, and smaller servings in restaurants and take home what they cannot finish. They should also check how much food they have before buying more and consume perishable items in which they buy them. If all the apples bought by urban households in Brazil, the US, India, Spain, the Philippines and the UK were eaten, 5.3 billion apples would be prevented from being wasted, enough to stretch more than nine times around the planet.

Even if Chinese people reduce their kitchen waste, a mass of organic and food waste for disposal in cities will remain. It is a systemic problem of today's urban consumerism. Separating kitchen (wet, organic) waste from other wastes helps, and in many countries, including China, large posters ask people to do so.

But consumers are not fools and should be taken seriously. A study conducted in Shanghai shows that although urban residents know how to separate waste, they do so only minimally. Why? Besides issues of smell and non-clarity, one of the main reasons for it is that sanitation authorities mix the separated waste during transportation. This defeats the purpose of waste separation in kitchens and discourages people from doing their share of the work.

Indeed, municipal waste systems should be capable of collecting and processing food waste separately and recycling it as fertilizer or animal feed. Technical capacity alone, however, is not enough to prevent food waste, and local governments are learning how to make people avoid and separate waste, Imposing charges for generating waste can be beneficiary in this regard.

Non-governmental organizations often invite consumers to show that they care. People should ask local authorities, supermarkets, restaurants and their favorite food brands how they are helping to reduce food waste in China. And teachers should be asked to pay attention to climate change, farming and responsible consumption to help create a healthier, more balanced society for all.

It all starts with care and curiosity. Start at home. Maintain a kitchen diary.

The author is manager of the Economic Justice, Policy and Campaign Unit of Oxfam Hong Kong in China.

Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US
主站蜘蛛池模板: 国产亚洲精品自在线观看 | 国产 一二三四五六 | 在线免费观看一级片 | 亚洲欧美日韩精品久久亚洲区色播 | 老司机毛片 | 狠狠色丁香久久婷婷综 | 亚洲不卡一区二区三区在线 | japanesevideo乱子 japanese日本tube色系 | 国产精品国产欧美综合一区 | 扒开双腿猛进入喷水免费视频 | 亚洲码一区二区三区 | 欧美成人影院 在线播放 | 久草在现| 真实国产乱人伦在线视频播放 | 91久久免费视频 | 欧美一级毛片特黄黄 | 在线欧美 | 亚洲精品综合欧美一区二区三区 | 99久久久国产精品免费播放器 | 动漫一级毛片 | 国产欧美日韩一区 | 波多野结衣3女同在线观看 波多野结衣aⅴ在线 | 国产精品毛片va一区二区三区 | 午夜爽爽性刺激一区二区视频 | 国产成人精品一区二区 | 亚洲 欧美 丝袜 | 欧美曰批人成在线观看 | 午夜伦y4480影院中文字幕 | 澳门毛片在线播放 | 永久黄网站色视频免费网站 | 日韩免费观看的一级毛片 | 亚欧美 | 亚洲国产欧美日韩精品一区二区三区 | 欧美国产综合视频 | 日韩美女大全视频在线 | 99久久精品免费看国产一区二区 | 欧美一级毛级毛片 | 亚洲人成在线播放网站岛国 | 亚洲国产成人久久综合一区77 | 亚洲精品91香蕉综合区 | 在线播放成人高清免费视频 |