Host: Japan Society of Material Cycles and Waste Management
Name : The 32nd Annual Conference of Japan Society of Material Cycles and Waste Management
Number : 32
Location : [in Japanese]
Date : October 25, 2021 - October 27, 2021
Within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), target 12.3 calls for halving per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels (12.3.1(b)), along with a reduction in food losses occurring in the earlier stages of the food supply chain (12.3.1(a)). The progress on target 12.3.1(b) is to be assessed by the Food Waste Index. This paper investigates the current situation of target 12.3.1(b) in various countries, through Voluntary National Review (VNR) reports on SDGs submitted by each country, as well as the Food Waste Index report by UNEP (2020).
We have so far investigated about 50 out of 253 VNR reports available as of July 2021. Not all targets are featured in each country's reports, and target 12.3.1(b) is one of the targets that are not well described in the reports. Only 2 reports indicated a concrete value for target 12.3.1(b).
On the other hand, the Food Waste Index report shows UNEP's estimated values on the index for 215 countries using data from 54 countries, however it is indicated that most countries values are of "very low confidence".
The findings imply that there is a need to disseminate to a large number of countries in the world, the importance of reducing food waste and a straightforward method for measuring it.
