Call for food waste to be made illegal
There are calls for urgent legislative action to stop food waste and tackle South Africa’s deepening hunger crisis.
"We have 20 million people hungry in South Africa - food vulnerable - millions of children to sleep hungry at night and this represents a quarter of our country," says Alan Browde, who is from Union Against Hunger and the founder of SA Harvest.
"The stunting rate where children have brain damage from lack of nutrition is 28% of our children up to the age of five. So the statistics are horrendous in South Africa."
He has been commenting on the situation here as the globe marks World Hunger Day.
According to Stats SA, 22.2% of households lack adequate access to food.
KwaZulu-Natal is the fourth worst-hit province with 23.9% behind the Northern Cape 34.3%, Eastern Cape 31.3%, Mpumalanga 30.4%
READ: SA food waste double blow to hungry, environment
Browde says that 10 million tonnes of food is wasted every year.
" It sounds unbelievable, but it's the fact, and what we have to do is we have to eradicate food waste and those meals that are wasted as a result, we have to feed to hungry people.
"So the first thing that has to be done in terms of food waste is to make it illegal. We cannot allow the food chain - farmers, processors, and retailers to waste food. They have to have goals and set targets.”
He says if just 1% of food waste can be saved in a year, that will mean providing an extra 400 million meals.
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