Hunger relief company Foodbank has called on the Federal Government to respond to issues of food waste and food insecurity.
Foodbank's new National Food Waste Strategy addresses Australia’s $20 billion food waste problem, but CEO Brianna Casey said a National Food Insecurity Strategy was required to ensure both problems are addressed.
“A food waste strategy is long-overdue, but we are concerned it appears to lack the necessary funding to ensure rapid implementation," Casey said.
"Nevertheless, it's a great first step in reducing the amount of perfectly edible food that's wasted, particularly given this country’s worrying food insecurity problem."
The latest Foodbank Hunger Report revealed 3.6 million Australians (15% of the population) were food-insecure, meaning they had experienced uncertainty around where their next meal was coming from in the last 12 months.
Surprisingly, almost half of food-insecure Australians are employed, with two in five of these households families with dependent children.
"How can it be that we produce enough food in Australia to feed approximately 60 million people, yet 3.6 million Australians were food insecure last year?" Casey said.
Foodbank argues that the issue is not so much that there is not enough food, but that the food isn’t getting to the right places, in the right time, to help address food insecurity and avoid waste.
As such, it is calling on the Federal Government to complement its National Food Waste Strategy with a whole-of-government strategy to address Australia’s growing food insecurity crisis.
To combat hunger in Australia, Foodbank works with farmers, manufacturers, and retailers to source fresh and manufactured foods for vulnerable Australians in need.
