HOUSEHOLD FOOD WASTE IN HUNGARY

KASZA GYULA

Keywords: Keywords: food wastes, sustainable food systems, consumer behaviour, circular economy JEL-codes: Q13, Q18, Q53

Teljes cikk
Food waste is one of the most important sustainability problems in the food chain. According to the UN, 8-10% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emission can be attributed to it, therefore Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 aims for halving food waste by 2030. The majority of food waste, 55% in the EU, is generated in households (72 kg/person/year). In Hungary, we have been measuring food waste since 2016, the launch of Project Wasteless. The Hungarian data for 2023 was 62 kg/person/year, of which more than 40% (26 kg/person/year) could be prevented. This corresponds to 250 thousand tons of unnecessarily produced bio-waste, mostly being incinerated or treated as landfill. The wasted food could cover the annual nutrition of 450 thousand people. Household food waste accounts for 2.8% of Hungary’s carbon footprint, and avoidable food waste alone responsible for 1.1%. This represents 7% of the household sector's carbon footprint.
The effects of Covid-19 and food price inflation are well observable in the data set. After several years of improvement, the figures at the end of 2023 showed a "bouncing back". The reasons might include the recovery from Covid, and the catching-up real incomes after the food price inflation shock. It is likely that the household food waste reduction campaign has already reached consumers who are more sensitive to this topic, and reaching the less receptive is progressing slowly (this can be also observed in other countries). The effects of the education program launched in 2017 will be also likely to appear later.
Although Hungary was among the first countries to launch a national household food waste prevention program, it is still unlikely for us to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal 12.3, similarly to the reduction target set in the current EU legislative draft. Some of the EU Member States have recently proposed an improved indicator based on avoidable food waste, which is realistically achievable.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.53079/GAZDALKODAS.69.3.t.pp_242-259