UK agency WRAP have published interim results from a research project examining consumer attitudes and behaviour around storage of fresh fruit & vegetables in the home. Recommendations have been givem as to how consumers and retailers can help to reduce the amounts of fresh fruit & vegetables thrown away in the home are based on a survey of current storage advice given, and an experimental research programme. Previous research by WRAP has revealed that 6.7 million tonnes of food is thrown away by UK consumers each year, equivalent to a third of food bought. Most of this could have been eaten, and 40% (by weight) of this avoidable food waste is made up of fruit & vegetables, worth almost £3 billion. Almost 90% of this fruit & vegetable waste consists of fresh produce, about 1.4 million tonnes, and most is thrown away as a result of not being used in time (before going off or out of date). For example the top five fruit and vegetables which get thrown away whole, without being touched are: § Apples – 4.4 million per day § Potatoes – 5.1 million per day § Bananas – 1.6 million per day § Tomatoes – 2.8 million per day § Oranges – 1.2 million per day The environmental, financial and health implications of so much fresh produce being thrown away makes this category one of the priorities for WRAP and the Love Food Hate Waste campaign. WRAP issued an open call for applications to its Innovation Fund in March 2007, for projects that would help reduce the amount of food thrown away by households in the UK. This project, led by East Malling Research, was one of the successful submissions. The objectives of the project were: § Gaining information from consumers on how they currently manage the storage of fresh fruit and vegetables in the home, on the types of products that are commonly wasted and the reason for rejection. § Assembling an easy to understand scale of relative perishability for different types of fruits and vegetables, to aid the consumer with best storage practice. § Developing and testing simple methods to prolong the freshness of fruit and vegetables in the home. § Reviewing the advice given by the major retailers to consumers about storage of fresh fruit and vegetables and suggesting improvements. § Providing information to WRAP and retailers to advise consumers about methods to ensure they consume a higher proportion of the products they purchase. The project is not due to complete and report until June 2008 but findings from the early consumer and experimental research, together with the retailer survey, suggested that there was a need to highlight key findings as soon as practicable. Consumer research This research was designed and executed with the objective of gaining information as to how consumers manage the storage of fresh fruits and vegetables in the home and to comment on the types of products that are commonly wasted and to determine why. The study had three parts: an attitude questionnaire; a daily diary of fruits and vegetables purchase, transport, storage and wastage over one week; and a spot check audit of fridge contents. 297 householders completed the survey, and 273 the diary. The fieldwork was carried out in August and September 2007. § The diary revealed that 40% of fruit by weight is stored fruit in the fridge; 60% elsewhere (56% in fruit bowl). In comparison 75% of vegetables were stored in the fridge. § The most commonly stated reasons for throwing away fruit and vegetables was that they were perceived to be mouldy slimy or ‘off’ in terms of appearance or texture. In a separate piece of research WRAP commissioned Exodus Research to conduct 1001 telephone-based interviews to explore consumer behaviour around food storage (“Food Storage and Packaging, 2007”). This research found that: § only 23% - 28% of people would store fruit in the fridge § 65 to 70% would store fruit in the fruit bowl § 53% – 57% would store vegetables in the fridge. Based on the consumer research undertaken by RSSL as part of this project we know where consumers are currently storing different types of fruit & vegetables. Comparing this to the recommendations based on the experimental research (and expert advice – see below), and knowing how much fruit and vegetables are purchased in the UK (from Defra’s Family Food & Expenditure Survey 2005/6 (http://statistics.defra.gov.uk/esg/publications/efs/default.asp)) we can estimate that: At least 1.2 million tonnes of fruit & vegetables are being stored outside of the fridge that would benefit from being kept cool. Even if 5% of this could be eaten rather than thrown away that would mean 60,000t less waste. Conversely there are fruits & vegetables, such as bananas and pineapples, that are best stored outside of the fridge, but the research revealed that some consumers were unaware of this. For example 6% of bananas were stored in the fridge – equivalent to over 40,000t. Conclusions and recommendations It is well known in the fresh produce industry that most fruit & vegetables keep longer at low temperatures (and high humidity), and where advice is currently being given to consumers it is largely consistent with this. For example many pre-packed apples do carry storage advice along the lines of “refrigerate for freshness” or “keep refrigerated”. However this research has revealed that in some cases this advice is not given on pre-packed produce, in very few cases is any advice given on how to store produce bought loose and little advice is currently available on retail websites. The survey (of five of the main UK retailers) revealed that advice was given on most pre-packed produce by most of the retailers (four of the five had storage information on more than 85% of pre-packed fresh fruit & vegetables; but one had storage information on only 37% of these products), but the situation was very different for fresh fruit & vegetables sold loose (free flow). The five retailers gave storage advice on only 6 – 19% (average 7%) of loose produce. Many consumers are unaware of storage advice, or of the benefits of following this advice, and there is a clear need to ensure that the correct storage advice is available to all consumers, regardless of how or where they shop. These new research findings have highlighted an opportunity for retailers to enable their customers to get more out of their fresh fruit & vegetables, by: § Reviewing the advice currently given to customers, on-pack, in-store and on-line. § Introducing advice where it is lacking, and making all advice clear and prominent. § Complementing this basic storage advice with relevant tips and information (for example recipes). In support of the Love Food Hate Waste Campaign, and as part of this research project, Sainsbury’s is trialling new storage guidance to customers both in store and on its website.