Our Pile of Food Waste

How much food are we wasting in Singapore?

Over the last decade, Singapore saw in increase of 45% of food waste produced. This number is predicted to increase even further as Singapore’s population and economy grows. In 2014, 788,600 tonnes of food waste, or US$1.4 billion worth of food, ended up as waste. To put these figures into perspective, we wasted about 1,500 Olympic-size swimming pools worth of food, or 2 bowls of food per person per day! However, only 13% of Singapore’s food waste was recycled in 2015, while the remaining food waste was sent to the landfill or incineration plant. Out of all kinds of wastes in Singapore, food waste ranks as the third lowest in terms of recycling rate. Unfortunately, food-waste recycling is often recognized as a “discretionary, a good-to-have behavior beyond the established norms” (Muruganathan, 2016). The figure below illustrates an uptrend of food wastage in Singapore, but with a relatively stagnant rate of recycling.

Credits: NEA and AVA