Variety of imperfect produce

“While the world wastes about 2.5 billion tons of food every year, the United States discards more food than any other country in the world: nearly 60 million tons — 120 billion pounds — every year. That’s estimated to be almost 40 percent of the entire US food supply, and equates to 325 pounds of waste per person.” That’s the data from Recycle Track Systems (RTS) for food waste in 2024. Meanwhile, there are around 35 million or more people in the US who don’t have enough to eat. Yet, we still continue to waste so much. Why?  

Sure, people’s actions are a problem. Though many of us understand that food waste is a major concern, we don’t take the ideal measures to make sure we do our part, which may include finishing the food on our plate, avoiding panic buying to allow other people who are in need of supplies to get their fair share of goods, etc. Everyone should have that sense that they have responsibilities in their community, which includes lending a helping hand whenever possible. But, looking at a wider scale, corporations and businesses have an even bigger responsibility when it comes managing their waste due to their large-scale operations. Specifically, I want to dive into the process that large grocery store chains go through when it comes to handling produce. 

Obviously, not all fruits and vegetables come out in the perfect shape or orientation after maturing. These are known as “imperfect produce”; some call them “ugly produce”. A question I want to ask you is whether you have ever seen these “imperfect produce” at your go-to grocery stores like Walmart, Trader Joe’s, etc. No, right? It’s usually the perfectly shaped ones on display for you to choose from, and some of you may have never even seen or heard of these so-called “imperfect produce” before! When farmers send off their fresh produce to these large grocery store chains, the produce gets sorted. Grocery store chains usually focus on making a profit, so they think about what their consumers would like to see. Since those “ugly produce” are considered unappealing, they are removed from being displayed, and most businesses unfortunately throw them away. If you think about how many grocery stores there are, not only in the US but in the whole world, with these wasteful decisions, THAT’S A LOT OF FOOD WASTE! Or in some cases, when farmers try to sell their produce, grocery chains often buy only the “perfect” produce. Thus, farmers are left with all the unwanted produce, and they eventually get chucked away. Think about how much produce is grown every day, and the growth is random so you can’t assume which carrot is going to come out perfectly straight and which is going to come out a little curvy. Maybe some batches could be fully “imperfect,” does that mean those whole batches will eventually get thrown out due to the way they look? Unfortunately, most of the time, yes. 

I heard about this problem after watching a Jamie Oliver show in 2015. Oliver is a British chef well-known for creating nutritious recipes inspired by cuisines all around the world. The show was called Friday Night Feast, where Jamie went to a yard with crates which were full of imperfect produce that were going to waste. It really was shocking to me that tons of produce could be wasted just like that. Even though Oliver was investigating the situation based in the UK, the problem is happening all around the world, especially in the US. There are barely any laws restricting the amount of waste that a large-scale grocery chain can generate, or demanding what these chains should do with their unsold food or produce. These so-called imperfect produce are honestly the exact same as the regular ones, it’s just that they look a little different. According to Commission Regulations from the EU, bananas had to be ‘free of abnormal curvature’ and at least 14 cm in length, while Class A cucumbers had to be ‘practically straight’. These bizarre laws caused tons of vegetables to be rejected by grocery chains, which in turn created an absurd amount of waste. Just because a banana is not as straight as you want it to be does not mean it is any less nutritious. But after Oliver spoke out about this issue, it got on the news and became a hot topic for months in the UK. The “wonky veg” situation improved drastically.

It is important that we get rid of our rigid consumer mentality and the idea that everything has to be “perfect,” but rather understand that our actions are creating a huge problem in the world. What is truly infuriating is that what some people consider “imperfect produce” are perfectly nutritious vegetables with slight imperfections that are caused by natural processes. Fellow sustainability specialist, Yazan Tadros, shed light on another issue within this problem: “A friend brought me some produce from a wholesaler that was selling “imperfect produce,” but I got a head of perfectly grown lettuce that just had two brownish leaves on it.” Is that really imperfect just due to the fact that the leaves went through a natural process of oxidation? Maybe the so-called “imperfect produce” are not so imperfect after all. 

There are some startups like Misfits Market or Imperfect Produce who have started trying to repurpose these “ugly produce,” but they are not well-known. Huge grocery companies are obviously helping us a great deal by providing us with resources that we need to survive. However, concurrently, there are some loopholes in their system that in turn are taking away resources from people who need them the most. Farmers put a lot of time and effort into growing such versatile produce, and to see it end up in landfill, where they decompose to produce greenhouse gases and, in turn, contribute to climate change is just a lose-lose situation. Companies should sell their “imperfect produce” at a cheaper price or donate them to food pantries or shelters where they can turn those otherwise beautiful and nutritious produce into hearty meals for the people who are in need. Today (the date this article gets published) is actually World Vegetarian Day! It’s the perfect day to start your journey to save food waste by getting your hands on some imperfect produce. Go on, what are you waiting for?

Works Cited

Food waste in America in 2024: Statistics & Facts: RTS. Recycle Track Systems. (n.d.). https://www.rts.com/resources/guides/food-waste-america/ 

COMMISSION REGULATION (EC) No 2257/94. (1994, September 1) Laying down quality standards for bananas (1994). https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLEG:1994R2257:20060217:EN:PDF

COMMISSION REGULATION (EEC) No 1677/88. (1988, June 15) Laying down quality standards for cucumbers (1988). https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A31988R1677 

Louise Eccles, B. C. for the D. M. (2015, January 1). Jamie Oliver Blasts “criminal scandal” of thousands of tons of wonky fruit and vegetables that are thrown away by supermarkets. Daily Mail Online. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2893618/Jamie-Oliver-blasts-criminal-scandal-thousands-tons-wonky-fruit-vegetables-thrown-away-supermarkets.html 

JamieOliver.com. (2024, September 9). How to cut down on food waste: Wonky veg: Features. Jamie Oliver. https://www.jamieoliver.com/inspiration/reclaiming-wonky-veg/