New research from the Fight Food Waste Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) and Central Queensland University claims that households could save up to $2500 a year by reducing food waste.
Researchers claimed that food waste from Australian homes costs the economy $19.3 billion every year, but most of this could be saved by local councils if they helped households minimise food waste instead of carrying the financial burden of disposing of the waste.
To reach the nation’s goal of halving food waste by 2030, households must reduce their food waste by 30 per cent. To achieve that, councils needed to intervene in their resident’s food waste habits, the report states.
Three key interventions councils could take to help instil habits include:
- face-to-face workshops – interactive and in-person workshops to focus on practical strategies and drive active participation
- short videos – leverage visual storytelling and concise messaging to help convey key concepts and tips to individuals of all demographics
- combination of interventions – workshops can be supplemented by informative emails, and digital channels can reinforce face-to-face messaging.
Practitioners, policymakers, and community organisations should adopt the 10 key recommendations in the report; that is:
- include food waste avoidance as a key organisational objective and set key performance indicators
- collaborate with delivery partners to achieve resource efficiency
- pay attention to content delivery of food waste messages
- put in extra effort developing interventions on the most impactful behaviours
- target three or fewer behaviours per intervention
- develop and test interventions and deliver customised messages through relevant platforms
- use interesting interventions that engage the target audience
- continuously monitor for participant engagement and improve
- conduct post-intervention evaluation
- use the Household Food Waste Reduction Toolkit to guide interventions.
The results after trials
The research trialled interventions with two local councils, both demonstrating positive results.
The residents of the Inner West Council reported a 45 per cent decrease in food waste after engaging in interventions, with each individual who took part in the engagement reporting an average of 30 per cent reduction in their household’s food waste.
Helen Bradley, resource recovery planning manager at Inner West Council, said that the numbers look promising after looking at the level of behaviour change and food waste reduction following initial interventions.
“Food waste messaging, when delivered effectively, can help us save money, help our community members save money and help reduce the environmental impact of food waste,” said Bradley.
“Having expert guidance, tools and support to design the intervention and deliver this messaging well proved invaluable.”
Meanwhile, Tasmanian residents were called to join the Eat Well Tasmania campaign, which saw 38 per cent of participants report decreased food waste.
Libby McKay, campaign manager at Eat Well Tasmania, said that evaluating interventions was the most crucial step in the process and she encouraged other organisations to connect with Fight Food Waste CRC.
“To have had support from and access to the expertise within the Fight Food Waste CRC team was invaluable— it was an opportunity to maximise not only the success of this project but also future interventions via the learnings gained from the evaluation,” she said.
Three key behaviours to effect change
While the household food waste reduction toolkit goes into detail on the categories of food waste and what habits need to be developed to tackle each one, lead researcher Dr Gamithri Karunasena said that there were three key behaviours that researchers found were the most helpful for participants who were reducing food waste and maximising groceries; that is:
- storing food correctly
- leaving one night a week to eat or repurpose leftovers
- learning new cooking skills
“We know Australians don’t want to waste food and that they welcome more support on how to do this effectively,” said Karunasena.
“This research highlights the important role community-based interventions play in combating household food waste and provides practical insights into the best approaches for doing this.”