gly?


By Elizabeth Royte


About a third of the planet’s food goes to waste, often because of the way it looks.


C an a carrot have two roots? Would you eat


a tomato that’s shaped like a duck? Would you buy a pepper that’s twisted like a pretzel? If you ask food buyers and supermarkets, the answer to these questions is no. A lot of food sellers think no one will buy


weird-looking food, so they toss it before trying to sell it. But all that discarded, freaky-looking food starts to add up. Each year, 1.3 billion metric tons of food gets wasted. A lot of it because it doesn’t look pretty.


Waste Not, Want Not T e problem of food waste is more than cosmetic, though. It’s a pretty complex issue. T e way food is grown and processed in the world and how it is shipped and delivered can have an impact on whether something gets eaten or not. Here’s an example. In developing nations, a


lot of food goes bad aſt er it has been harvested. T at’s because many of these countries lack big enough storage facilities, refrigeration, or good roads for transport. In developed nations, food is wasted when


restaurants or grocery stores order, serve, or display too much food. What doesn’t get eaten gets thrown away. Food is also wasted when people ignore the leſt overs in the back of the fridge or throw food out before it has gotten old or expired. Nearly 800 million people worldwide suff er


from hunger. But about a third of the planet’s food goes to waste. If this wasted food were given to the hungry, there would be enough to feed each person more than twice over. So why isn’t this happening?


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