Food Loss & Waste Day: Building Sustainable Systems
- 29 Sep 2026 23:09 WIB
- Voice of Indonesia
RRI.CO.ID, Jakarta – The world observes the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste every 29 September. Established by the United Nations General Assembly in 2019, the observance aims to raise awareness and encourage collective action to reduce food loss and waste.
Food loss refers to food lost after harvest and before reaching the retail stage, while food waste mainly occurs at the retail, food services, and household levels. Both challenges hinder efforts to build more efficient and sustainable food systems.
According to the United Nations Environment Programme, around 1.05 billion tonnes of food were wasted in 2022, equivalent to about 19 percent of food available to consumers. Households accounted for 60 percent of the total, followed by food services at 28 percent and retail at 12 percent.
The scale of food waste also represents a massive loss of resources used to produce, process, transport, and store food. The Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that uneaten food consumes around 28 percent of the world’s agricultural land.
Food loss and waste also contribute to climate change through greenhouse gas emissions. FAO estimates that food loss and waste account for around 10 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.
In 2026, FAO and UNEP are highlighting “The Transformative Potential of Reducing Food Loss and Waste” to emphasize its broader benefits of reducing food loss and waste. Such efforts can improve food security and nutrition, reduce pressure on natural resources and greenhouse gas emissions, and enhance productivity and economic benefits.
Reducing food loss and waste is also part of the Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG Target 12.3, which calls for reducing food losses along production and supply chains and halving per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels by 2030.
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