Nearly 70 million meals will go to waste in Scotland next month, a study
by Zero Waste Scotland has revealed.
In total, 67m meals will end up being thrown out and 84 per cent of households will have food left over from Christmas Day.
Festive favourites including turkey (56%), roast potatoes (34%) and Brussels sprouts (30%) are most likely to go uneaten.
Iain Gulland, chief executive of Zero Waste Scotland, said: “As a nation, we will waste thousands of tonnes of food this festive season, a lot of which is avoidable. To put this into context, more than £11.5 million of meat and poultry alone will be thrown away throughout December.
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“Everyone really wants to enjoy Christmas Day, but no one likes throwing away money or good food. Taking simple steps, such as resisting the urge to overbuy and using a shopping list to avoid doubling up on ingredients, are easy ways we can all reduce food waste and do our bit to tackle climate change.”
With people across the nation identified as planners, panickers or survivalists, a leading psychologist said the key to a happy, healthy festive meal experience is making time to enjoy it with friends and family.
The YouGov survey, commissioned by Zero Waste Scotland, reveals as many as a million people in Scotland who celebrate Christmas leave it until the last minute – with 21% of those questioned saying they or someone in their household buys food the week of Christmas and 43% stating they buy it in the third week of December.
More than one-third (35%) don’t do any planning before heading to the shops to buy their Christmas meal. In contrast, one in five (20%) say their festive food planning begins this month or earlier.
Overall, one-quarter admitted to feeling worried or stressed when shopping for food for Christmas Day (3% and 22% retrospectively).
Zero Waste Scotland has partnered with Dr Esther Papies, from Glasgow University’s School of Psychology, to develop a series of simple tips to
ease anxiety around feeding family and friends.
Ms Papies said: “Christmas food shopping can seem really difficult. Most of our eating during the rest of the year is influenced by our habits, but around Christmas everything changes and our usual habits don’t work.
“The food we eat and the number of people we cook for are usually very different over Christmas compared to the rest of the year. As a result,
we often end up buying and preparing too much food.
“Remember, your Christmas meal doesn’t need to be too big or perfect – focus on what Christmas feels like, not what it looks like. Make enjoying time with friends and family a priority, with a nice home-cooked meal part of
the experience.”
Ms Papies offers some useful tips on how to tackle the Christmas Day food shop.
They include:
1) Plan, plan, plan. Taking time to think about how many people you will be cooking for and how much they will likely eat – for example, a young child won’t need the same amount of food as an adult – and write a list. Having a list will help lay out what you need and will help you to remember any staple items we typically forget.
2) Remember, your Christmas meal doesn’t need to be too big or perfect
– focus on what Christmas feels like, not what it looks like. Make enjoying time with friends and family a priority, with a nice home-cooked meal
being only one part of the overall experience.
Food waste is a significant contributor to the global climate crisis, and the true cost to the planet of Scotland’s wasted food more than doubles when emissions from growing, processing and cooking it are taken into account.
If wasted food is then sent to landfill the environmental impact are even
worse because this emits methane, one of the most damaging greenhouse gases.
Visit the Love Food Hate Waste Scotland website for more top tips on how to reduce waste this Christmas at: www.scotland.lovefoodhatewaste.com/
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