On Friday, I went to pick up a few grocery items to have on New Year’s Eve and the following day, just as I had done prior to Christmas. As I filled the refrigerator with produce and some cheeses, I realized I was short on shelf space and would have to put my new purchases under the stack of uneaten goodies I had bought the week before. What I ended up doing. for the most part, was throwing away the salads and the cut veggies I had bought for Christmas and setting aside the sliced meats for the dog next door. What hit me really hard as I filled my trash can with perfectly good food was how I had miscalculated the prospects of my going out versus staying home.
So I stopped for a moment and did a quick Google search. What I found was that, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization there are approximately 925 million people in the world who are hungry and in need of basic nutrition – with some 44 million having been pushed into that category by rising food prices between June 2010 and February 2011 alone. Yet we throw away around 50 percent of the total food we produce. Now just think about all the water, nutrients and labor it takes to grow that food, energy to transport it, the vast amount of packaging it requires, and the fact that half of it ends up in the garbage. This is absolutely crazy — and I now realize I have been part of the problem.
So I have resolved to wake up on New Year’s morning with one of my goals for 2012 to become part of the solution instead. Perhaps you’d like to join me in making that resolution. Happy New Year.