Currently more than 2m tonnes of good-to-eat surplus food is wasted annually in the UK, the equivalent of 1.3Bn meals.
Meanwhile, up to 10m people, including 2.5m children, in the UK are in food insecurity, which means they are skipping meals and struggle to get enough to eat. The pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis have dramatically increased the number of people in food insecurity.
Lindsay Boswell, chief executive of FareShare UK, said: “At a time when millions more people across the UK are being forced into food poverty, FareShare does not have enough food to meet the skyrocketing demand caused by the cost of living crisis.
“This crisis is, for many, a bigger financial emergency than the Covid-19 pandemic. At a time of so much need, it is wrong that there is so much waste. We are urging the government to take action and help us get more good-to-eat surplus food to people who need it.”
FareShare, which gets good-to-eat surplus food to a network of nearly 9,500 charities, is asking for £25 million in funding to help meet increasing demand for its food. This could save the Government an estimated £140 million and prevent the wasteful emissions of nearly 70,000 tonnes of C02e.