Study: Germans want to reduce food waste

Too good for the bin: the willingness of consumers to take action against food waste has increased in recent months.

81% of Germans have deliberately avoided food waste in the last six months or plan to do so in the near future. This is the result of a survey conducted as part of the initiative Zu gut für die Tonne! (English: Too good for the bin!) of the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL). Thus, the consumer’s willingness to combat food waste has increased. In the previous year, just under 78% gave a positive answer to this question.

Women are more committed combating food waste than men

Around 85.6% of women deliberately avoided food waste. In contrast, only 76.2% of men avoided to throw away deliberately. Older people are more willing to do something about food waste in everyday life than younger people. Of the 50-59 year-olds, 85.4% want to do something, compared with 75.8% of the 20-29 year-olds. In order to throw away less, the predominant majority (62.5%) of respondents wants to shop more consciously. 52% want to recycle residues more effectively and 34% want to pay more attention to the storage of their food.

According to the survey, Germans show a high awareness of their own share of food waste. Approximately 85.5% of the respondents affirmed that consumers are responsible for a large proportion of food waste. 91.4% are aware that valuable resources such as water, energy and soil are also squandered as a consequence of wasted food. A majority of 73.7% of those surveyed are convinced that individuals can also take action against food waste.

For this survey, the market research institute GfK conducted personal interviews in November  2017 with 1,014 people from all over Germany who are representative of the German population aged 14 and over.