Almost half of all food produced in the US is wasted: Can Congress help?
Could a simple label change help reduce the produced in the Untied States that is wasted every year?
That鈥檚 the hope for a group of lawmakers, consumer advocates, and industry groups currently working to clarify and standardize the "expired" and "best by" labels on many food products.聽Researchers in聽聽have found that confusion about food labels causes approximately 20 percent of avoidable food waste each year.
In the United States, , according to the Natural Resources Defense Council, amounting to between $1,300 and $2,300 per family of four. What's more, food waste takes a toll on the environment, both as it rots in landfills, and as it heightens demands on the agricultural system.
"One of the people seem to have at home is about whether or not food should be thrown out just because the date on the label has passed. It's time to settle that argument, end the confusion and stop throwing away perfectly good food," said Rep. Chellie Pingree (D) of Maine, who co-sponsored the Food Date Labeling Act with Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D) of Conn., in a statement.
Some people don't realize that there is no federal standard for the "use by" labels, says Sally Greenberg, executive director of the National Consumers League, a consumer advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.
"Many consumers believe that ... it鈥檚 a federal government label, and it鈥檚 actually a manufacturer label dealing with optimal freshness, or maybe optimal taste," says Ms. Greenberg, whose group is backing the legislation, in an interview with 海角大神.
"They assume that it鈥檚 done for purposes of safety and quality, and that isn鈥檛 the case," she says.
One of the , where the "use by" label is subject to federal regulation. In that case, the date stamp indicates when the formula鈥檚 nutrient content degrades, according to the US Department of Agriculture.
In Congress, the issue appears to be gaining momentum, if slowly. Representative Pingree鈥檚 bill received a positive reception during a House Agriculture Committee hearing last month, where 聽by Rep. Mike Conaway (R) of Texas, the committee鈥檚 chair.
鈥淭his Congress isn鈥檛 particularly active.聽We just haven鈥檛 had a lot going on, so we were thrilled to have the opportunity to move forward on an issue that really is bipartisan,鈥� she told the Huffington Post.
At , Representative Conaway suggested that reducing food waste could be accomplished through other means, including public education efforts. "This is one of those great bipartisan, broad-support [issues] that nobody has to wait on government to fix," he said.
Greenberg of the Consumers League says that if it passes, the new labels could take a few years to make it to fridges across the country.
But even without legislation, the support of industry groups, including giants Campbell Soup Company and Nestl茅, could mean that manufacturers will begin introducing best practices for food labeling on their own, she tells the Monitor.
Campbell has taken other steps to reduce food waste, including to harvest excess peaches and turn them into peach salsa for a local food bank.
As many advocates for the proposal gathered at a on Tuesday at Harvard Law School, in Cambridge, Mass., Greenberg says she鈥檚 hopeful that the effort to adopt a unified labeling standard could make its way through Congress.
鈥淭his really ought to be a bipartisan issue. No one wants to waste food, everyone knows that farmers and schools and hospitals and universities lose money when we throw food out,鈥� she says. 鈥淭his is really the perfect bipartisan issue.鈥�
