DOHA: The amount of food wasted in cash-rich Qatar which, ironically, is dependent largely on imports for its food requirements, is massive, according to the National Statistics Office.
The Qatar Statistics Authority (QSA) said in a release yesterday that more than half of the municipal waste generated in the country contains discarded food.
In the oil-rich GCC region as a whole, which is a net importer of food struggling to have food security, it is estimated that one-third of the waste generated consists of discarded food. The QSA issued the release on the eve of the World Environment Day being observed today.
The theme for this year’s World Environment Day is ‘Think.Eat.Save’, which is an anti-food waste and food loss campaign that encourages you to reduce the “foodprint”. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), every year 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted.
This is equivalent to the same amount produced in the whole of sub-Saharan Africa. At the same time, 1 in every 7 people in the world go to bed hungry and more than 20,000 children under the age of 5 die daily from hunger.
According to the Qatar Green Building council, more than half the municipal solid waste generated in Qatar is compostable, including leftover food.
The Peninsula
