Abstract
Diverting food waste away from landfills is one way to minimise its serious environmental impact. Given that over a third of Australian households have at least one pet, the feeding of food waste to dogs constitutes one potentially significant waste diversion path. However, the proportion of dog owners that feed food waste to their pets is unknown. Moreover, there has been no investigation into any relationship between practices of feeding scraps to pets and the animals’ body condition, living arrangements (inside or outside) and exercise regime. To provide some insight, this paper presents findings from three surveys across two Australian studies. The first reports both pet and dog-specific findings from two surveys within a wider food waste research project (n = 1017), establishing that 28% of respondents fed leftovers to pets as a main food waste minimization strategy, yet in only 5% of households did this constitute more than half of the household’s food scraps. This modest diversion of food scraps from landfill to feeding pets was reflected in the finding that there was no significant difference seen in the claimed level of food discards to the waste stream for households feeding food scraps to dogs and those that did not. The second—a dog owner specific study (n = 355)—found that almost half (44%) of respondents reported feeding table scraps to dogs. They were more likely to be females, owners of medium sized dogs, and in larger households. There was no significant difference in self-rated dogs’ body condition scores between respondents who fed table scraps to their dog and those who did not. Further multidisciplinary research is recommended to reconcile the social, veterinary and environmental risks and benefits of feeding food waste to animals.
Highlights
Whilst food security is of increasing global concern, so too are issues of food waste
This is mirrored to some extent in the domestic sphere, where food waste can occur at key stages related to the purchase, preparation, consumption and disposal of products intended for human consumption [5]
In the absence of research on the topic of feeding food to pets that was originally intended for human consumption, namely food scraps, the aim of this paper was to understand what proportion of owners fed scraps to their dogs, their demographics, decision-making, household composition, and types of dogs
Summary
Whilst food security is of increasing global concern, so too are issues of food waste. It is estimated that up to a quarter of food brought into the home is subsequently discarded uneaten [1], representing a significant waste of environmental and economic resources [2,3,4]. This represents a concomitant waste of animal life. 16% of Australian household food waste is animal meat [3]. Food waste occurs across the food supply chain, from “paddock to plate”. This is mirrored to some extent in the domestic sphere, where food waste can occur at key stages related to the purchase, preparation, consumption and disposal of products intended for human consumption [5]
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