Brussels needs ambassadors to fight food waste at home.
Between 2020 and 2021, Brussels aims to prevent food waste with 30% at consumer level. 15 citizens are now given the chance to become an ambassador for the campaign ‘Food Waste Mission Brussels’.
Contrary to common belief, consumers actually waste the most of the whole food supply chain. On average, 53% (Fusions) of food wastage happens at household level. This is not only a waste of resources, it represents tremendous losses of money for families and costs in waste management for the city.
With the newly launched campaign, called Food Waste Mission Brussels, FoodWIN vzw aims to tackle that problem.
Loick Bekaert from FoodWIN vzw explains: “Food waste is a complex societal problem, considering that scientists of Project Drawdown concluded that fighting food waste is the third best strategy to fight climate change, you can only imagine how big the food waste pile really is.
Reducing emissions is not the only opportunity however, since citizens waste the most, around 173 kg a year per person (EuroParl), they also have a lot to gain. If you reduce your food waste, you’re in the running to save up to €445.72 (Fusions) a year as a family.”
The potential positive impact on Brussels is big and Loick Bekaert is determined: “An urban lifestyle comes with uncertainty in eating patterns. Plans change easily: you decide to go out to eat with a friend while you already bought ingredients for a home cooked meal, food shops are nearby so you tend to go more often, … These dynamics significantly increase a consumer’s chances of wasting food.
However, there are many simple tricks to counter this. You can for example increase shelf life by sorting food according to temperature zones in your fridge, learn the meaning of different date labels, or cook with parts of vegetables you would otherwise discard.
The goal is to show that everyone who has the right knowledge is able to drastically reduce waste at home. If 15 “regular” inhabitants can do it, everyone can. Together, we can really make a difference in our city.”
The 15 ambassadors receive free training by 5 coaches, all experts on reducing consumer food waste. Thanks to free training on subjects like zero waste cooking, smart shopping, fridge management, etcetera, the selected ambassadors gather the skills and knowledge to overcome 9 different challenges. The ambassadors will document their journey and their achievements which will be used as a source of inspiration in a massive Brussels-wide awareness campaign to reduce food waste in Brussels households during 2021.
In other big cities, this approach has worked. London for example, decreased household food waste by 7% (Wrap) following an intensive awareness campaign.
Every Brussels’ citizen is welcome to apply to become one of the 15 ambassadors before 31/08 through www.foodwastemission.be.
The Food Waste Mission is an initiative of FoodWIN with the support of Brussels Environment, as part of the Good Food strategy.
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