Food is the primary need for every creature in this world, including humans. However, human greed often results in losses, including food. Humans, in their social lifestyle, often buy food beyond their biological needs, such as; buying food that is trendy just because of ‘prestige’, buying food that exceeds their portion size, and the irony is, if the food doesn’t run out, they can easily just throw away the leftover food. The behavior of wasting food is detrimental. Because, leftover food that is wasted will gradually accumulate in the disposal and become food waste which is called food waste.
Reporting from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), food waste is defined as food/food fit for consumption that is wasted either before/after its expiration date. The problem of food waste has become a global concern, because the amount is quite large. 1/3 (one third) of the food produced for human consumption in the world is thrown away as waste.” The amount is around 1.3 billion tons per year. The value of wasted food waste is estimated at USD 680 billion for developed countries and USD 310 billion for developing countries. Meanwhile, 815 million people in the world suffer from hunger. The total waste available can actually support 2 billion people (World Hunger News, 2016). Meanwhile, in our country, Indonesia itself, it is recorded that per person produces 300 kg of food waste every year, p. This is what ultimately makes Indonesia the country with the second largest food waste in the world after Saudi Arabia (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 2016). Based on records provided by the Department of Cleanliness and Parks in one day and night, the Benowo LPA can collect 1,220.15 kg of waste (Sulistyorini, 2006) with 73% being organic waste and the other 27% being inorganic.
CAUSES OF FOOD WASTE
Food waste occurs when edible food is intentionally thrown away by consumers after it has spoiled, passed its expiration date, or is simply thrown away.
Reporting from the UN Environment Program’s (UNEP) Food Waste Index Report 2024, of the 1.05 billion tons of food wasted in 2022, 19% of food came from retail, food services and households, while 13% of food was lost in the supply chain.
The loss/decrease in food quality that occurs at the production stage is mainly caused by lack of skills, natural disasters, lack of adequate infrastructure, and poor practices causing the quality of food products to deteriorate before they reach the hands of consumers. Sometimes, food waste can also occur due to excessive production. Overproduction occurs when restaurants, grocery stores, and other similar establishments order more food than they need, resulting in an increase in the amount of perishable food that is wasted. Additionally, retailers tend to reject many foods because they do not meet quality and aesthetic standards.
THE RELATIONSHIP OF FOOD WASTE WITH THE SGDs MOVEMENT
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) are a collection of 17 global goals designed to be a blueprint for achieving a better and more sustainable future for all. The SDGs, which were established in 2015 by the UN General Assembly, are expected to be achieved by 2030, as part of UN Resolution 70/1, Agenda 2030. Reducing food waste is one of the SDGs resolutions that will help meet various Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), specifically the 12th goal, namely “By reducing waste, we will also reduce business costs, create social and environmental benefits, and increase consumer savings”.
THE RELATIONSHIP OF FOOD WASTE WITH LOW POLITIC AND HIGH POLITIC ISSUES
There is data obtained from UN Environment which shows that if food waste could be compared with countries in the world the result would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the United States. Food waste contributes to producing methane gas where this gas has the potential to be a greenhouse gas, increasing global warming 34 times more than carbon dioxide gas, high demand on agricultural land which requires clearing trees in forests, and wasting available water supplies. (Jessop, Sparks, and Graham-Rowe 2014). From an international relations perspective, what is released from this data, if we look deeper, there is a common thread that connects the problem of food waste with the issue of low politics, or even high politics.
Relation to Low Political Issues
The problem of food waste has become a crucial issue for the environment that is close to the waste collection site itself. But did you know that the issue of food waste has also become a low political issue?
A problem can be said to be a low political issue if the issue has an impact that is not only felt by individuals or communities, but has also spread to the domestic scale. In this case, food waste produces a negative impact on a country by increasing greenhouse gas emissions from the increase in the composition of methane and CO2 gas as a result of the decomposition process of food waste. This disrupts the composition of the air in a country and changes the country’s climate by increasing extreme temperatures called heat waves. This impact can certainly disrupt the country’s domestic mobility.
Another thing that is detrimental to a country as a political issue is the increase in hunger rates due to food scarcity. This country will certainly experience economic and ecological losses that can disrupt its social welfare.
Relation to High Political Issues
If the problem of food waste has spread to the issue of food security due to food scarcity, then the population of a country experiencing this will inevitably carry out mass migration, resulting in an explosive exodus of a country’s population to neighboring countries or even a regional exodus. This can cause conflict between the immigrant country and the host country, making it a high political issue.
In other large-scale cases, if the problem of food scarcity occurs on a global scale caused by food inflation, it is possible that countries will carry out political diplomacy and lobby in the context of interdependence.
IMPACT FROM FOOD WASTE
Extreme Climate Change
Food waste that ends up in landfills produces large amounts of methane – a more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2. For those who don’t know, excessive amounts of greenhouse gases such as methane, CO2, and chlorofluorocarbons absorb infrared radiation and heat the Earth’s atmosphere, causing global warming and climate change.
Causing Famine
Social aspects, food waste can cause an increase in food prices or food inflation, food becomes difficult to obtain, especially for the poor, resulting in malnutrition due to food scarcity.
Waste of Water Resources
Considering that agriculture accounts for 70 percent of water use worldwide, food waste also represents a huge waste of freshwater and groundwater resources. It is said that the water used to produce uneaten food each year is three times the volume of Lake Geneva in Switzerland.
Ecological Losses
About 3.4 million hectares of land, which is approximately one-third of the world’s total agricultural land area, is used to grow wasted food.
Economic Losses
Meanwhile, from an economic aspect, there is a waste of money, especially if the food is not consumed and then thrown away. This can trigger inflation.
FOOD WASTE MANAGEMENT EFFORTS
To stop food waste, changes must be made at every stage of the process which can start from:
• Farmers and food processors to supermarkets and individual customers. As a first step, priority should be given to balancing production and demand. This means less use of natural resources to produce excess food that will rot in the fields.
• Large restaurants, supermarkets, retail outlets and individual consumers can also reduce their “food footprint” by identifying where waste occurs and taking steps to address it, as the City of San Diego did in January 2022 .
• Consumers should also try to purchase food according to their eating plan to avoid wasting edible food.
• If the food remains unfit for human consumption, it can be used to feed livestock, saving valuable resources that would otherwise be used to produce commercial feed.
• If food cannot be reused at all, then it should be composted or, at least, recycled. The average home can divert approximately 330 pounds of food waste per year from local waste disposal facilities by incorporating home composting into their daily practices.
CONCLUSION
Food may be cheaper when you buy in bulk, but in reality, you’re not really saving money when all you do is throw it in the trash at the end of the week.
The longer the food is wasted in the food chain, the greater the impact on the environment because we also have to consider the energy and natural resources expended in processing, transporting, storing and cooking the food.
More efforts must be made to develop better processes for harvesting, storing, processing and distributing food. If there is an oversupply, steps should be taken to redistribute food or divert it to people in need. Although the UN says that food production must be increased by more than half to meet the demands of a growing population by 2050, the actual increase will be much smaller if food waste is reduced.
SOURCES
•https://environment-indonesia.com/penyebab-food-waste-dan-dampaknya/
•https://ejournal3.undip.ac.id/index.php/interaksi-online/article/download/24811/22173
•https://journal.admi.or.id/index.php/JUKIM/article/view/752
•https://www.lifefoster.eu/food-waste-reduction-sustainable-development-goals/
•https://sdg12hub.org/sdg-12-hub/see-progress-on-sdg-12-by-target/123-food-loss-waste
