American Wasteland: How America Throws Away Nearly Half Of Its Food (and What We Can Do About It) (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
Without being preachy or highly political, the author proceeds to document food waste from various perspectives and recommends solutions to make our food supply last longer. Wonder why everything in the supermarket produce section looks perfect? It's because anything perfectly edible with a slight imperfection either doesn't make the cut (and may end up in a can) or worse, ends up in a handfill where it may remain "fresh" for a long time to come. And as for us as consumers? Please, don't get me started. Everyone should read this book. The amount of food we waste daily is shocking and just plain wrong. With millions starving, disposing of edible food is sinful and when one considers the resources required to grow and transport food to consumers, it is doubled waste. It takes 15 tons of water to produce 2.2 pounds of red meat.An estimated 32 percent of fresh vegetables in supermarkets, restaurants, and households is wasted.The average US supermarket produce item travels 1500 miles before it arrives at its destination.We grow and raise more than 590 billion pounds of food per year and waste a quarter and a half of all food produced in the US. That is 169 million pounds of food annually, more than enough to fill the Rose Bowl to the brim.Many more sickening facts in this book. But we can both reduce and redistribute edible food. The author offers a number of blueprints for better managing food resources.
What do You think about American Wasteland: How America Throws Away Nearly Half Of Its Food (and What We Can Do About It) (2010)?
Interesting but not groundbreaking. Someone returned it to the library before I could finish it!
—bookworm
An eye opening account of the massive amounts of food wasted each day while so many go hungry.
—James2017
Really interesting. Made me determined to use everything in my fridge up.
—xxvintageexx
