Towards zero waste: A comprehensive framework for categorizing household food waste

Abstract

One-third of food produced for humans, approximately 1.3 billion tonnes annually, is wasted, with households contributing over 60 % of this waste. This waste has significant environmental, social, and economic impacts. Previous studies have examined the problem of household food waste but lacked sufficient specificity in categorizing waste streams, hindering the development of targeted interventions. This paper addresses this issue by systematically developing a novel household food waste categorization framework that enables a more targeted and potentially effective approach to intervention design aimed at reducing household food waste. Specifically, it revolutionises existing classification systems and introduces a novel, practical nine-stage categorization framework, rigorously validated with 190 household food waste occurrence descriptions and expert feedback. Users of the framework correctly categorized 92 % of household food waste samples identifying 165 as edible, with 92 as eatable and 73 as not eatable. Domestic food preparation and consumption stages showed the highest waste instances (91), followed by planning and purchasing (77), emphasizing the framework's effectiveness in identifying key areas of focus for reducing food waste within households. The role of the framework for developing future interventions to reduce household food waste is discussed.