Transcript:
Most Americans report feeling stressed about the rising cost of groceries.
But there’s a way to trim your food budget without big changes to your diet or where you shop: cutting food waste.
Sara Burnett is with ReFed, a nonprofit dedicated to reducing food waste. She says the average U.S. family of four spends more than $3,000 a year on food that ends up getting thrown out.
Burnett: “That’s everything from the leftovers that you brought home from the restaurant that you never end up eating. It’s those herbs in your crisper that you only use a little bit … and the rest go to waste.”
Wasting food is also bad for the climate. It means more food than necessary gets produced, processed, and transported, which creates carbon pollution. Plus, when food rots in a landfill, it releases climate-warming methane.
To cut back on waste, Burnett suggests menu and recipe planning to better estimate how much food to buy.
Burnett: “How many green peppers do I actually need for that recipe of stuffed peppers?”
Make one night a week a leftovers night and freeze what you can’t eat within a few days.
By making it a priority to eat what they buy, families can reduce their climate impact – and take a bite out of their grocery bill.
Reporting credit: Sarah Kennedy / ChavoBart Digital Media
