Food Waste & Recalls: What You Should Know

Food waste is a problem. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, about one-third of all food produced is never eaten.

As a business, you probably don’t realize how much of your product ends up in the trash. But when dealing with recalled food, even if it’s only a tiny percentage, that can add up quickly.

Even though there are ways to reduce your food waste from recalled products, how do you know where to start? And what kind of impact will it have on your company and your bottom line?

Recalled Food: How It Contributes to Food Waste

Food recalls occur when products are found to be contaminated or unsafe for human consumption. They can be issued by the FDA or a company if there are issues with their products. When companies issue recalls, it means they have already been distributed and consumed. This means that even if a product is eventually deemed safe for consumption, it will still contribute to the amount of wasted food in America every year because consumers may have already consumed them before being told not to eat them anymore.

While there’s no way to know how much of this contaminated food ends up in landfills instead of being donated to charity or used in animal feed, there are plenty of other reasons why we should be concerned about food waste related to recalls:

1. Recalled foods are often thrown away before they even reach consumers. This means that all the money spent growing and processing the ingredients gets wasted along with transportation, packaging, and marketing costs.

2. Recalled foods often end up in landfills, producing harmful greenhouse gasses like methane.

Restaurants and grocery stores should immediately remove any remaining recalled products from sale or service. Donate them to charity organizations such as homeless shelters or soup kitchens if it is still edible. If the product has already been consumed, throw it away in a sealed plastic bag and place it in an outdoor trash container so that animals cannot access it.

How Businesses Can Reduce Their Food Waste

If you’re serving food that has been recalled, check with your local health department or the manufacturer before disposing of it—you may be able to donate or sell it instead.

Take advantage of unused ingredients and turn leftovers into new meals instead of throwing them out.

Benefits of Reducing Your Business’s Food Waste

Save Money: If you’re throwing out food that’s still edible, you could be losing up to hundreds on wasted products.

Social Impact: By donating or recycling unused food instead of tossing it in the trash, you’re helping those in need and reducing waste going into landfills. This helps to reduce greenhouse gasses produced by decomposing garbage.

Environmental Impact: Fewer people will be affected by climate change because fewer greenhouse gasses will be released into our atmosphere when we don’t throw away food that can still be eaten!

The Peanut Butter Project is just one example of how CheckSammy has helped businesses reduce their food waste output. After a massive peanut butter recall, one Fortune 500 business was left with masses of worthless inventory.

CheckSammy successfully removed and disposed of 208 pallets of Peanut Butter at a food waste processing facility—130,000 pounds were gathered for diversion in total. CheckSammy effectively solved the producer’s problem while ensuring that the food was disposed of sustainably.

We understand how challenging it can be to reduce your carbon footprint when you have so many other things on your plate—but when you partner with CheckSammy, we take care of all the logistics so you can focus on growing your business.

We have the knowledge and resources to ensure that your business can access the best organic services at competitive prices. We offer everything from composting bins to curbside pickups and compost turnarounds; contact us today for more information!