Pass it on
A few statistics for us to chew upon:
Were you as shocked as me when images of rotting grains left in open? Were you left as sick with the feeling of how shameful we should be of letting that sort of criminal food wastage pass us by without us doing anything about it? In a country where reportedly over 250 million people go to bed hungry every day, food wastage is a social crime. Committed by all of us. During one of my usual "woeful" chats with my mother a.k.a Amma I made a comment on how no one seems to be doing anything about it. She in her usual practical and wisdom filled mode said, "It just takes one, you make fundamental changes and then pass it on...your message to not waste food."
That is how I started following the Reinvent-Reuse-Repair mantra...a mantra that my parents love to follow and somehow they have managed to pass it on to my sisters and me. Simple things like reusing left over poppadums adding some dessicated coconut and you have a snack ready. With that initial prodding I realized that individually speaking, food wastage can easily be reduced and I follow few simple rules and stick by them. I don't shop arbitrarily. I make a list. I check what needs to be re-stocked and then go ahead and then shop for the same. Cooking food as per required only is as important as planning meals and menus and has worked wonders for me. Everyday food wastage can be reduced drastically with a little bit of thought. Every time I see extra rotis that will not be eaten I cringe, because somewhere at the back of my mind I hear my Amma muttering under her breath, " So many people are starving and you dare waste food!" That inner voice of my mothers is enough for me to quickly saute some onions and add a few masalas and turn the left over rotis into some roti-upma! So if you have any of your "save food and avoid wastage recipes"...do please pass it on!!
- In India, 40 per cent of all the fruits, vegetables and food grains never make it to the market, because it lays rotting under bad storage conditions.
- In India million tonnes of wheat (equivalent to the entire production of Australia) goes wasted.
- A country like Australia has the dubious distinction of throwing out more than $5 billion worth of food each year
- World wide 7 million tonnes of food worth around $16 billion is thrown away each year
- In India almost 30% of our fruits and veggies die slowly due to inadequate storage facilities and tons
- In India most parties, weddings and restaurants are guilty of wasting around 15-20% of cooked food.
- A country like Canada food retailers waste 1.6 million tonnes of food every year owing to rejection of certain edible fruit and vegetables (all because they may not look as good (read shiny-apparently looks matter, and I thought only taste matters!!)
Were you as shocked as me when images of rotting grains left in open? Were you left as sick with the feeling of how shameful we should be of letting that sort of criminal food wastage pass us by without us doing anything about it? In a country where reportedly over 250 million people go to bed hungry every day, food wastage is a social crime. Committed by all of us. During one of my usual "woeful" chats with my mother a.k.a Amma I made a comment on how no one seems to be doing anything about it. She in her usual practical and wisdom filled mode said, "It just takes one, you make fundamental changes and then pass it on...your message to not waste food."
That is how I started following the Reinvent-Reuse-Repair mantra...a mantra that my parents love to follow and somehow they have managed to pass it on to my sisters and me. Simple things like reusing left over poppadums adding some dessicated coconut and you have a snack ready. With that initial prodding I realized that individually speaking, food wastage can easily be reduced and I follow few simple rules and stick by them. I don't shop arbitrarily. I make a list. I check what needs to be re-stocked and then go ahead and then shop for the same. Cooking food as per required only is as important as planning meals and menus and has worked wonders for me. Everyday food wastage can be reduced drastically with a little bit of thought. Every time I see extra rotis that will not be eaten I cringe, because somewhere at the back of my mind I hear my Amma muttering under her breath, " So many people are starving and you dare waste food!" That inner voice of my mothers is enough for me to quickly saute some onions and add a few masalas and turn the left over rotis into some roti-upma! So if you have any of your "save food and avoid wastage recipes"...do please pass it on!!
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