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With nearly 100 percent certainty I can assure you we won't be hearing President Barack Obama and GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney, or their respective surrogates, talking about America's food waste dilemma (or what I and others would describe as a crisis) in the months ahead. That's too bad since food waste is creating significant social, economic and environmental consequences for the US (and the world).
This growing crisis and the fact that discarded food provides a unique lens through which to view the water/energy/agriculture nexus (a topic of great interest to us here at GRACE and Ecocentric), prompted me to take a closer look at the food that goes uneaten and how it impacts Americans. While researching this trending topic, I learned some interesting facts I thought I'd share.
What a Waste!
1. Between one quarter and one half of the more than 590 billion pounds of food produced each year in the United States is squandered during the farm-to-table supply chain. Using this range, food writer and food waste expert Jonathan Bloom estimates that, every day America wastes enough food to fill the Rose Bowl - the 90,000-seat football stadium in Pasadena, California - and sometimes it's as much as two stadiums full.
18 Little-Known Facts That Will Motivate You to Cut Back on Food Waste
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By Kyle Rabin
Alternet, August 21, 2012
Straight to the Source
