As increases in the cost of food become a more relevant issue for families across the Lower Mainland, waste reduction and efficiency have a seat at the head of the table.
To help inform shoppers on how to save on their shopping lists while still making healthy choices, Metro Vancouver and Safeway recently teamed up for a six-week in-store campaign called Love Food-Hate Waste.
Margaret Broughton, chairwoman of the North Shore Table Matters Network and community nutritionist, said the main reason local families reported wasting food was because the products were past the best-before date. She's calling for more education around the role of best-before dates, when a product is still safe to use and when it's actually expired. The Love Food-Hate Waste team also focused on ways to keep food fresher for longer and how to utilize leftovers.
"Menu planning is a skill people have lost a little bit, we don't have that much emphasis on food because it has been so cheap. I think with the increasing cost of food people will naturally become more mindful about how they use it," Broughton said. "Healthy eating and food planning all go together and maybe as the price of food increases people will become more interested in spending a bit of time thinking about those things."
