Zero Waste Team: Family Food Waste Prevention Pledge

From The County Zero Waste Team:

It’s that time again, time to take a look at what we might do to improve our lives in the New Year.

Often, we make resolutions to improve our health, save money for things we want, make time for our families or work to heal the planet.

How about accomplishing all those goals with one money and time saving resolution, that improves health and the environment?

It’s probably not one you’ve thought much about, but it is powerful: Waste Less Food.

In the U.S., households waste an average of $1,500 per year on food they don’t eat. That’s like throwing $125 out your car window every month! Consumers, people like you and me, throw away 25 percent of the food they buy, which wastes not only money but shopping and cooking time, too.

Often, it’s the healthiest food that gets discarded—fruit, milk and vegetables that become science experiments in the back of our refrigerators.

All this waste hits hard not only at home, but in our environment as well. When food is wasted, we waste all the resources that go into producing that food. Twenty-five percent of our freshwater, farmland the size of New Mexico, fertilizers, and labor are lost when we waste food. This adds up in the atmosphere, too, greatly adding to greenhouse gas emissions which impact climate change.

Here’s a way for your whole family to resolve to reduce food waste – take the Family Food Waste Prevention Pledge:

  • Find a few minutes to sit down with your clan and talk about how to implement these steps.
  • If you need more “How-To” info, check out SaveTheFood.com for many helpful tools and tips.
  • Print out the Pledge form from LosAlamosNM/GoGreen, or ZeroWaste@lacnm.us. Then post it on your fridge to remind everyone of their pledge.

If you have questions, feel free to contact the Zero Waste Los Alamos Team at ZeroWaste@lacnm.us.

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