Publication
Title
Less food wasted? Changes to New Zealanders' household food waste and related behaviours due to the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown
Author
Abstract
Food waste is a crisis of our time, yet it remains a data gap in Aotearoa New Zealand's (NZ's) environmental reporting. This research contributes to threshold values on NZ's food waste and seeks to understand the impact of the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown on household food waste in NZ. The data presented here form part of the 'Covid Kai Survey', an online questionnaire that assessed cooking and food planning behaviours during the 2020 lockdown and retrospectively before lockdown. Of the 3028 respondents, 62.5% threw out food 'never'/'rarely' before lockdown, and this number increased to 79.0% during lockdown. Participants who wasted food less frequently during lockdown were more likely to be older, work less than full-time, and have no children. During lockdown, 30% and 29% of those who 'frequently' or 'sometimes' struggled to have money for food threw out food 'sometimes or more'; compared with 20% of those who rarely struggled to have money for food (p < 0.001). We found that lower levels of food waste correlated with higher levels of cooking confidence (p < 0.001), perceived time (p < 0.001), and meal planning behaviours (p < 0.001). Understanding why food waste was generally considerably lower during lockdown may inform future initiatives to reduce food waste, considering socio-economic and demographic disparities.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Sustainability
Publication
2021
ISSN
2071-1050
DOI
10.3390/SU131810006
Volume/pages
13 :18 (2021) , p. 1-16
Article Reference
10006
ISI
000702024600001
Medium
E-only publicatie
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Project info
inFLOOD: A study about the influence of food media on food consumption patterns in Flanders.
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 08.11.2021
Last edited 17.11.2024
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