Roughly one third of the food produced who human consumption around the world is wasted. That’s 1.3 billion tonnes a year, which beggars belief when you consider the famines and food shortages we are confronted with routinely. Surely, we can do better. 

Taking a think globally, act locally approach, Kiama Council is on the hunt for “food huggers” to join a project to reduce food waste.

Rose Childe, Waste Management Projects assistant, said the food huggers would spend two weeks looking at how they managed their food waste at home.

“One task is emptying your fridge of spoiled or expired food, or food you won’t eat, and record how much you throw out” Ms Childe said.

“Other tasks include measuring your food waste from two days when you cook at home.”

The food huggers will be asked to fill out surveys to get an idea of their awareness of food waste and food waste habits before and after their participation.

Ms Childe said the Food Smart Project was an initiative of the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA), which was seeking to determine the amount of food waste generated in NSW.

“When you sign up you’ll get a free toolkit which contains a shopping bag, tea towel, bag clips and action cards to help you complete your work,” she said.

“If you complete the whole project you’ll get a set of nifty Food Huggers for your kitchen which help keep your cut fruit and vegetables fresh.

“You’ll also go in the draw to win one of 10 prize packs of glass food storage containers valued at $100 each.”

“The best thing of all is that our food huggers will probably discover new ways to save money by reducing how much food they throw away.”

To participate in the project, food huggers must be over 18 and be responsible for either shopping for, cooking or storing food in their household. To become a food hugger, drop in to council’s Administration Centre at 11 Manning St, Kiama to sign up and receive a toolkit. You can ring council on (02) 4232 0444 to make other arrangements