British supermarket Sainsbury’s has pledged its support to an ambitious new Food Waste Reduction Roadmap developed by IGD and Wrap.
According to Sainsbury’s, tackling food waste is one of the business’s key areas of focus. It has undertaken a variety of initiatives for a number of years now, it says.
By signing up to this roadmap alongside fellow UK retailers, food producers, manufacturers, hospitality and food-service companies, Sainsbury’s says it can align with businesses across the UK to commit to ambitious targets and continue to cut food waste in its own operations. In addition, Sainsbury’s says it’ll be able to work with suppliers and customers to reduce their own levels of waste.
“We’ve been working hard to tackle food waste,” Sainsbury’s Brand Director Judith Batchelar said. “We continue to take significant steps forward in keeping it to an absolute minimum across our entire value chain.
“This roadmap is an important implementation to ensure businesses across the UK act consistently, while continuing to make progress towards the global UN SDG Target 12.3. There are some ambitious milestones in here. We’re fully committed to working together with our suppliers and customers to continue to ensure we hit our targets.”
Tesco calls for transparency
In related news, Tesco Chief Executive Dave Lewis has called on the global food industry to be more transparent. It should publish its food-waste data, he said.
Mr Lewis called for this action while speaking in New York. He announced that 27 of Tesco’s biggest suppliers, as well as Booker, with whom Tesco merged earlier this year, will publish their food waste data for the first time.
He also revealed that 10 of Tesco’s branded suppliers will commit to target, measure and publish their food-waste data within 12 months. They will include Mars, Unilever and General Mills.
Tesco became the first UK retailer to publish the amount of food wasted in its operations in 2013. It says it’s more than 70 per cent of the way towards its target – that no food that is safe for human consumption goes to waste.
Tesco published figures for its Republic of Ireland and central-European businesses for the first time last year.