Updated Household Food Waste Figures
For the most up-to-date information on the Courtauld Commitment please refer to: The Courtauld Commitment 2030 Milestone Report 2023.
For the most up-to-date information on household food and drink waste in the United Kingdom, including estimates on quantity and types of waste, reasons for discarding, financial costs, and greenhouse gas emissions, please refer to the Household Food and Drink Waste in the United Kingdom 2021/22.
Key points
- The baseline covers household food waste and data for the supply chain: retail, manufacture and the hospitality & food service sector.
- Total household food waste is now reported as 7.1 million tonnes.
Restating the Household Food Waste figures
We have restated the
Household Food Waste (HHFW) figures to ensure we conform to how food waste is defined and described under the
FLWS, the international standard that WRAP helped develop with partners including
World Resources Institute,
The United Nations Environment Programme (UN Environment), the
UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, the
Consumer Goods Forum and the
World Business Council for Sustainable Development.
The standard aims for greater international consistency in measurement, reporting and action on food waste.
What does this mean? WRAP has restated 2015 data for household food waste, and for key historical years, using the international definitions and classifications for food waste. We no longer classify food waste under three categories of ‘avoidable’, ‘possibly avoidable’ or ‘unavoidable’ food waste, but simply as either wasted food (edible parts), or the associated inedible parts.
Total HHFW is now reported as 7.1 million tonnes rather than 7.3 million tonnes. This is entirely due to food purchased for human consumption, but ultimately fed to animals (200,000 tonnes), no longer being classified as ‘food waste’.
The impact of this change to the figures is shown below in the Figure 2 infographic below.
Courtauld Commitment 2025 baseline
The
Courtauld 2025 baseline (against which progress to reduce UK food waste will be measured) is the first time the UK has had a complete and comparable estimate for total food waste, post farm gate, for the same year. It totals 10.2 million tonnes.
The C2025 baseline covers household food waste as well as data for the supply chain: retail, manufacture and the hospitality & food service sector.
The
Courtauld 2025 food waste prevention target is to reduce food & drink waste arising in the UK by 20% by 2025 compared to 2015, calculated as a relative reduction per head of population. Achieving the target would reduce per capita food waste from 156kg per person to 125 kg per person, resulting in 1.5 million tonnes a year less food waste arising in 2025 compared to 2015.
The restated HHFW figures combined with the food waste across the supply chain is broken down below in the Figure 1 infographic below.
