紐時賞析／全美30%食物被浪費…白宮推新策略 防食品落入掩埋場

White House Announces New Strategy to Keep Edible Food Out of Landfills

白宮推新策略 防食品落入掩埋場

The Biden administration on Wednesday issued, for the first time, a national strategy to combat a major national problem: food waste.

拜登政府於周三首度宣布一個國家策略，以對抗一個重大的全國性問題：食物浪費。

Roughly 30% of the country’s food supply isn’t eaten, but thrown away or otherwise wasted. In fact, food is the single largest volume of material sent to landfills and incinerators in the United States. When uneaten food goes into landfills, it breaks down and produces as much greenhouse gas emissions annually as dozens of coal-burning power plants, according to the federal government.

該國食物供應量中約30%沒被食用，而是被丟棄或以其他形式浪費。事實上，在美國，食物是被送往垃圾掩埋場和焚化爐的最大量單一物料。聯邦政府指出，沒被食用的食物進入垃圾掩埋場時會分解，每年產生的溫室氣體相當於數十座燃煤電廠的排放量。

The White House strategy involves efforts to change the behavior of businesses and individuals to reduce waste, as well as to fund research into extending the shelf life of perishable foods, expand food donations and turn food waste into usable commodities such as compost, gas or animal feed.

白宮策略包含努力改變企業和個人的行為，以減少浪費，及資助研究延長易腐壞食品保存期限，擴大食物捐贈和將食物廢棄物轉為可用商品，如堆肥、燃料和動物飼料。

“Everyone has a role to play in reducing food loss and waste,” the secretary of agriculture, Tom Vilsack, said in a statement.

美國農業部部長維爾薩克在一則聲明中表示：「每個人都可發揮作用，減少食物損失和浪費。」

The strategy falls short of food-waste laws in other countries and even those of some U.S. states. It contains no new regulations. Dana Gunders, head of ReFED, a research and advocacy group that works on food waste, called the strategy “a good first step.”

這項策略不如其他國家甚至美國一些州的食物浪費法。它沒有包含新規範。研究和倡議組織ReFED致力於改善食物浪費，其負責人達娜．岡德斯稱，這項策略是「好的第一步」。

The U.S. set out in 2015 to cut food waste by half by 2030. In reality, per capita food waste grew between that announcement and 2019, the most recent data available, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

美國2015年宣示，要在2030年以前將食物浪費量減半。事實上，美國環保署指出，最新可用資料顯示，從當時宣布到2019年，人均食物浪費仍在增加。

According to ReFED’s latest figures, in 2021, the U.S. produced 91 million tons of unsold, uneaten food. Nearly half of it was still edible, but only 2% was donated.

ReFED最新數據顯示，在2021年，美國生產了9100萬噸未被售出、未被食用的食物。這些食物中近半仍能食用，但只有2%被捐出。

ReFED’s research has found that 20% of food is lost at the farm level in the U.S. Stores, restaurants and industrial kitchens throw out food that doesn’t sell. And in homes, many people discard food that’s still safe to eat, in part because “best by” labels don’t necessarily indicate when food is bad.

ReFED研究發現，在美國，有20%的食物在農場層級就被丟棄，商店、餐廳和工業用廚房會丟棄沒有賣出的食物。而在家戶，許多人丟棄仍可安全食用的食物，部分是因為「賞味期限」標籤上的日期不一定是指食物到那天就會腐壞。

There’s been some progress in cutting food waste. Between 2019 and 2022, eight supermarket chains that had voluntarily pledged to reduce food waste reported a 25% decline in their total volumes of unsold food.

減少食物浪費已有些進展。2019至2022年間，八間自願承諾減少食物浪費的連鎖超市報告稱，其未售出食物總量減少25%。

Startup companies have popped up in recent years to crack the waste problem. Some use artificial intelligence to spy on what gets tossed so that retailers can make better procurement decisions. Apps offer budget-minded shoppers deals on about-to-perish groceries and restaurant meals.

近年來為解決浪費問題，新創公司不斷湧現。有些公司使用人工智慧監看被丟棄的東西，讓零售商能做出更好的採購決策。一些應用程式，提供精打細算的顧客即期食品雜貨和餐廳餐點等優惠。

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【張佑生】

美國有浪費食物的問題，許多國家的人民連飽食一頓都是苛求。其中的差異在於，美國或先進國家注重的是食品安全(food safety)，對於即將超過有效期限(about-to-perish)的食品敬而遠之。

開發中或貧窮國家的問題是糧食安全(food security)，這個詞的意思其實是食物充足，強調的是數量，food safety偏重食物品質。當然，只有食物供應(food supply)無虞之後，才能講究品質，但過度計較品質，就容易產生廚餘(food waste)的問題。

美國聯邦政府迄今尚無規範廚餘的相關法律(food-waste laws)，只能算是全國性策略(national strategy)。垃圾焚化爐的英文是waste incinerator，焚化廠是incineration plant，掩埋場是landfill。

Budget-minded也可以用budget-conscious，買東西時總有成本考量，精打細算的消費者。budget travel通常是independent travel （自由行），budget airline是廉價航空。