A staggering 2.9 million tons of good-to-eat farm produce is being dumped in landfill, incinerated or sent to waste treatment plants that produce biogas as soaring numbers of people go hungry nationwide, an Evening Standard investigation reveals.
These mountains of edible farm products — including carrots, courgettes, mushrooms, cauliflowers, lettuce, potatoes, onions, apples, pears and oranges — are enough to provide the equivalent of seven billion meals a year. What makes this waste especially egregious is that it comes at a time of record need nationwide, with 13.7 million people, including four million children, experiencing food insecurity in the summer, according to the Food Foundation, a figure that has more than doubled since 2020.
