Food Waste and Food Distribution

Selaine Saxby Excerpts

Tuesday 16th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Vaz. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) on securing today’s important debate. As she mentioned, 4.6 million tonnes of edible food are wasted in UK households annually. Around a quarter of that food waste is because too much food has been prepared, cooked or served.

I have been a big supporter of FareShare and its work, which in 2023 delivered 33,500 meals through six local community groups back home in North Devon, and more than 132 million meals nationwide. FareShare is the UK’s largest food redistribution charity. It takes surplus food from the food industry that would otherwise go to waste and gets it to a network of 8,500 charities across the UK. However, budget constraints meant that FareShare had to turn down up to 2 million meals-worth of good-to-eat surplus food last year.

I wrote to the Chancellor last November to support the food redistribution sector, because I felt that it was important that the Government continue to support FareShare’s invaluable work for our communities, and that they reconsider the ringfencing of funding for the sector. I am glad that after FareShare’s continuous campaigning, the Government have recently announced a new £15 million fund to tackle surplus food at farm level. The fund will enable farmers to redistribute surplus food that cannot be used commercially. As a very rural MP, I occasionally see different surplus food products in my constituency. I met FareShare very early on in my time in this place, and I was particularly interested to discuss its work with the Country Food Trust, which has championed dishes such as pheasant curry and venison bolognese as high-protein meat sources.

I also want to highlight the Government’s work to combat food waste. They have invested £2.6 million and have supported the Courtauld commitment 2030, which works for a more sustainable supply chain to tackle food waste and reduce greenhouse gas emissions and water use. Commitments also include a target to halve food waste by 2030.

In 2022, the Government consulted on options to improve food waste reporting by large food businesses in England. More than 380,000 responses were received, and hopefully DEFRA will be considering whether mandatory food waste reporting should be introduced in the future. Nearly £13 million has been awarded to over 250 redistribution organisations across the country since 2018 for the provision of warehousing, vehicles, fridges and freezers.

Weekly collections of food waste will be introduced for most households across England by 2026, ending the threat of waste waiting weeks for collection and cutting food waste heading to landfill. I find it bewildering that when I am up in London I have to put my food waste in the bin with everything else, unlike when I back home in North Devon, where we have a separate food caddy collection, so many thanks to North Devon Council for its work in ensuring that the weekly collections continue. I hope that we will be able to stop the move towards the three and four-weekly bin collections that have been seen in some areas of the UK, because we do not want food waste, particularly in a hot summer, to be sat on the doorstep for too long.

When I supported FareShare’s #FoodOnPlates campaign back in 2021, I said that wasting good food should never be cheaper than feeding people. I ask the Minister to look again at some of FareShare’s requests on how to incentivise businesses to redistribute more surplus food and consider long-term plans, such as the national food strategy, to recognise the bigger picture of how our food system is also linked to our environmental goals.

Many residents at home in North Devon have raised concerns with me about the rise in food prices, which impacts us all. As a result, many charities have reported financial difficulties. As the redistribution of food falls within a cross-departmental remit, I hope that the Minister will be able to share some insight into what is being done behind the scenes to support this crucial sector. Let me take this opportunity to put on the record my thanks to everyone back home in North Devon for their ongoing work on food distribution and to reduce our food waste.