French legislation banning the destruction of edible food could go global if the man behind the scheme has his way.
Arash Derambarsh, a local councillor in a Paris suburb, has campaigned against food waste and this led to a national law obliging French supermarkets to find outlets, such as charities, for its unsold but edible food stuffs.
He persuaded French MPs to adopt the regulation after a petition gained more than 200,000 signatures and celebrity support in just four months.
He called it “scandalous and absurd” that food is wasted and in some cases deliberately spoiled while the homeless, poor and unemployed go hungry.
Now Derambarsh wants other countries to follow the French example and pass similar laws. He is to table the issue in September when the UN discusses its Millennium development goals to end poverty, in November at a G20 summit and again in December at a UN conference on the environment.
Initially the councillor collected and distributed food no longer wanted by his local supermarket.
“Every day we’d help around 100 people. Half would be single mothers with several children, pensioners or public workers on low salaries, the other half would be those living on the streets or in shelters,” he said.
Eventually the initiative saw legislation passed to prevent supermarkets from throwing away food which is near the best-before dates. The outlets frequently poison such food with bleach to stop foraging.
The amendment is part of a wider law covering economic activity and equality in France. It is expected to be approved this week.
In France alone, an estimated 7.1 million tonnes of food goes into the bin every year - 67% of it by consumers, 15% by restaurants and 11% by shops. The figure grows to a staggering 89 million tonnes across the EU and 1.3 billion worldwide.
