Food waste matters - A systematic review of household food waste practices and their policy implications

By Karin Schanes, Karin Dobernig, Burcu Gözet. 2018

1,223 citations recorded by the source corpus.

In recent years, food waste has received growing interest from local, national and European policymakers, international organisations, NGOs as well as academics from various disciplinary fields. Increasing concerns about food security and environmental impacts, such as resource depletion and greenhouse gas emissions attributed to food waste, have intensified attention to the topic. While food waste occurs in all stages of the food supply chain, private households have been identified as key actors in food waste generation. However, the evidence on why food waste occurs remains scattered. This paper maps the still small but expanding academic territory of consumer food waste by systematically reviewing empirical studies on food waste practices as well as distilling factors that foster and impede the generation of food waste on the household level. Moreover, we briefly discuss the contributions of different social ontologies, more particularly psychology-related approaches and social practice theory. The analysis reveals food waste as a complex and multi-faceted issue that cannot be attributed to single variables; this also calls for a stronger integration of different disciplinary perspectives. Mapping the determinants of waste generation deepens the understanding of household practices and helps design food waste prevention strategies. Finally, we link the identified factors with a set of policy, business, and retailer options.

Subfields: Food Science, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Sociology and Political Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/fde0a47a935d3d0a506b00d5b50a6030c8af0e46

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Citations in the corpus

Review: Consumption-stage food waste reduction interventions – What works and how to design better interventions (2019, methodology): “Our review of these studies (Table 1) reports how and what each study revealed (Aschemann-Witzel et al., 2016; Carlsson Kanyama et al., 2017; Chen et al., 2015; Hebrok and Boks, 2017; Porpino, 2016; Quested et al., 2013; Schanes et al., 2018; Thyberg et al., 2015; Xue et al., 2017).”
Drivers of food waste reduction behaviour in the household context (2021, background): “Indeed, the most effective way to trigger pro-environmental behaviour was observed to be arousing a deeper sense of community and convincing consumers that their actions have long-term consequences on future generations (Schanes et al., 2018).”
Green apparel buying behaviour: A Stimulus–Organism–Behaviour–Consequence (SOBC) perspective on sustainability‐oriented consumption in Japan (2021, background): “Remarkably, although the literature on food waste has paid increasing attention to shopping routine (Schanes et al., 2018), the variable seems to be largely ignored in other areas concerned with pro-environmental behaviour.”
Quantities, Determinants, and Awareness of Households’ Food Waste in Italy: A Comparison between Diary and Questionnaires Quantities’ (2019, methodology): “With reference to behaviors and attitude, some of our results are in contrast with most of the scientific literature—for instance, the role of shopping list and place for shopping in food waste quantities—but, apparently, literature regarding food waste is still at a screening phase, where the resul”
“Reduce Food Waste, Save Money”: Testing a Novel Intervention to Reduce Household Food Waste (2019, background): “…of what drives food wasting behavior (Schanes, Dobernig, & Gözet, 2018; Visschers, Wickli, & Siegrist, 2016), how to develop effective policies and programs to reduce household food wasting (Hebrok & Boks, 2017; Schanes et al., 2018), and how to adequately evaluate interventions (Hoj, 2012).”
Demand-side solutions to climate change mitigation consistent with high levels of well-being (2021, positive): “In developed countries, consumers are the largest source of food waste, and habitual adjustments, such as meal planning, re-use of leftovers, and avoidance of over-preparation reduce associated GHG emissions 20,21 .”