By Gilly Smith. Originally published on Food Planet Prize
A new approach to redirect global food waste to feed its inhabitants could also mitigate some of the biggest challenges of climate change.
The Global Food Donation Policy Atlas, known simply as The Atlas, claims to offer the most comprehensive examination of food loss and waste (FLW) and food donation policies in countries around the world, having worked directly in over 25 countries. Created by Harvard Law School’s Food Law and Policy Clinic (FLPC) and The Global FoodBanking Network (GFN), it aims to find solutions to global FLW and food insecurity through a circular economy approach.

Around the world, a staggering one-third of food is either lost or wasted, despite over 2.4 billion people facing food insecurity. Typically, this waste ends up in landfills, where it breaks down and releases greenhouse gases (GHGs), fueling climate change. Alarmingly, FLW contributes to 8-10% of global GHG emissions. The problem spans across the entire food supply chain, from production and processing to storage, transportation, and consumer use. Despite the clear challenges associated with FLW, existing laws in most countries make it cheaper and easier to send food to rot in a landfill instead of donating it.
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