Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what further steps the Government is taking to reduce food waste in UK supermarkets.

The Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP), which receives funding from Defra, launched the Courtauld Commitment 2025 in March 2016. This is an ambitious voluntary agreement that brings together organisations across the food system. Retailer signatories represent up to 95% of the UK food retail market. It is a ten-year commitment to identify priorities, develop solutions and implement changes at scale, both within signatory organisations and by spreading new best practice across the UK. The commitment goes further than ever before with ambitious industry targets to be reached by 2025. One of these is a 20% per capita reduction in food and drink waste in the UK.

On 21st December the Secretary of State announced that we will set up a new fund through the WRAP to ensure charities get additional resources to help redistribute food to those who need it rather than letting it go to waste. WRAP will make £0.5 million available to charities and other organisations. The new Food Waste Reduction Fund will provide grants to finance specific projects: fridges or vehicles, IT systems and software, or for training staff and volunteers about food safety skills.