Australian Businesses Fight Food Wastage

Article by: Hari Yellina (Orchard Tech)

Simplot Australia has become the first organisation to sign up for the Australian Food Pact. It is one of several of Australia’s biggest food industry participants to join the new collaboration tackling Australia’s $36.6 billion food waste challenge. The Australian Food Pact is a voluntary agreement featuring major companies including Woolworths Group and Coles as founding signatories.

Launched in October last year, the program is led by Stop Food Waste Australia (SFWA) which hopes to assist with the Australian government’s target of halving food waste by 2030. SFWA chief executive officer Dr Steven Lapidge said food waste was a local, national and global challenge. According to statistics, Australians waste 7.6 million tonnes of food each year, equivalent to more than 300kg of wasted food per person per year.

Simplot managing director Graham Dugdale said the company strongly aligns and identifies with the Australian Food Pact’s goal and mission. The founding signatories for the Australian Food Pact are Simplot Australia, Woolworths Group, Coles, Mars Australia, Mondelz Australia, Goodman Fielder, ARECO Pacific and McCain Foods, with other household names indicating they will follow in the coming months. Overseas experience shows that voluntary agreements work, and based on the heartening response from our food industry to the Australian Food Pact, it will work here as well.

By joining the Australian Food Pact, signatories will be able to improve profitability, respond to supply risks and opportunities, provide innovative solutions, be more competitive, and create quality products with lower environmental impacts. The Australian Food Pact represents a major step forward in our bid to reduce food waste.