Abstract
The 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic had various influences on people’s ordinary lives, including their thoughts and behaviors related to food consumption. Food waste has been cited as a serious issue with environmental, social, and economic consequences. In this study, we investigated how the COVID-19 pandemic altered the social consciousness and behavior related to food waste in Japan. We conducted a nationwide online-based survey and collected a cross-sectional dataset from 1959 adult respondents. The results showed that people in regions highly impacted by the pandemic reported a clearer understanding of the situation of their household food waste, more careful food preparation and purchasing, and were more strongly influenced to change their behaviors due to COVID-19. Further analyses revealed that thoughts and behaviors related to food waste significantly differed by sociodemographic characteristics, such as gender, household size, and employment status. This study also implied that the COVID-19 pandemic encouraged some improvements in peoples’ behaviors and thoughts with regard to food, such as paying attention to food waste, making efforts to reduce food waste, and attempting cooking by themselves at home.
Highlights
Nearly one-third of the food produced for human consumption is either lost or wasted, which is four times the amount of food needed annually for eliminating global hunger [1]
Food waste reduction has been included among the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda and is highlighted by SDG 12.3 that aims to: “halve per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains” by 2030 [5]
This study investigated how people’s thoughts and behaviors on food waste were influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic
Summary
Nearly one-third of the food produced for human consumption is either lost or wasted, which is four times the amount of food needed annually for eliminating global hunger [1]. Food waste is imposing serious environmental, social, and economic consequences [2,3], and has been considered as one of the most important sustainability issues at the global level [4]. Food waste reduction has been included among the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda and is highlighted by SDG 12.3 that aims to: “halve per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains” by 2030 [5]. Food waste refers to food that is fit for consumption but left to spoil or discarded by consumers and retailers [6]. Food loss normally occurs in the first stages of the food supply chain and includes food that is spilled or spoilt before it reaches its final product or retail stage, which is the main problem in low- and middle-income countries [10,11]
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