Increases in Household Food Waste in Canada as a Result of COVID-19: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

The era of the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a variety of individual lifestyle and behavioural changes, and could, therefore, potentially involve a shift towards more sustainable food systems. This research was conducted through an online survey of cross-sectional design. We surveyed 8272 Canadians in August of 2020. Participants answered questions about socio-demographic food waste amounts in kilograms, and food-waste-management behaviours. In this exploratory study, we assessed the relationships between socio-demographic variables, and self-reported food-waste behaviours through two-tailed significance testing. Results indicated that Canadian households self-reported an insignificant decrease in food waste during the pandemic. Respondents reported allowing food to expire, not utilizing leftovers, and not finishing meals. Understanding food-waste behaviour changes is key to designing effective mitigation strategies to reduce household food waste and to minimize the environmental consequences with which food waste is associated.

A review of the effects of COVID-19 on food waste

“… Behavioural factors : In the reviewed papers, behavioural factors tended to relate to food purchasing, preparation, and management. All of the papers highlighted the pandemic’s significant alteration of these behaviours, which was shown to change the production of food waste in most cases (Alazaiza et al, 2022 ; Amicarelli & Bux, 2020 ; Amuakwa-Mensah et al, 2021 ; Babbitt et al, 2021 ; Ben Hassen et al, 2020 , 2021 ; Borsellino et al, 2020 ; Kubíčková et al, 2021 ; Liu et al, 2021 ; Pires et al, 2021 ), though with some exceptions (Bogevska et al, 2021 ; Music et al, 2021 ). …”

“…Interestingly, Schmitt et al ( 2021 ), Cequea et al ( 2021 ), and Pires et al ( 2021 ), in their respective studies on Brazilian, Brazilian and Peruvian, and Portuguese consumers, did not observe an increase in online food buying and delivery, in contrast with many other studies – perhaps due to cultural reasons. Of interest, the adoption of sustainable food management practices was not always significantly associated with a reduction in food waste (Music et al, 2021 ). In fact, Music et al ( 2021 ) argued that, although consumers employed new management behaviours during the pandemic (e.g., eating more leftovers), these behaviours did not result in a significant reduction in food waste, perhaps due to poor planning (Music et al, 2021 ).…”

Waste-to-wealth; nutritional potential of five selected fruit peels and their health benefits: A review

“…production while in developing countries about a hundred kilograms of food per person per annum is wasted at the consumption stage (Makanjuola et al, 2020: Haley et al, 2021Music et al, 2021). In the European Union, food waste was defined as any food substance, raw, cooked, that is discarded since 1975 until 2000 (Porpino, 2016).…”

“…This has very crucial environmental impact through the waste of resources used to produce, package and distribute the food (Bellemare et al, 2017). In Canada, it was reported that 58% (35.5 million tonnes) of all food is wasted per year (Haley et al, 2021;Music et al, 2021). The value of wasted food amounts to CA$21 billion; such amount of food would be sufficient to feed all Canadians for five months.…”

“…The University of Arizona conducted a study in 2004, which indicated that 14 to 15% of United States edible food is untouched or unopened, equivalent to $43 billion worth of discarded but edible food (Mourad, 2016). The developed countries governments have developed strategy on shortlived climate pollutants to reduce avoidable food waste within the countries (Haley et al, 2021;Music et al, 2021), For example, the Canadian government has implemented a Food Policy, which is a movement towards a more sustainable food system. In February 2019, the government brought many experts together from different countries to contribute and share ideas on how to resolve the problems of food waste across the food supply chain (Haley et al, 2021;Music et al, 2021).…”