‘Best before’ dates on food products should be banned to help fight climate change, the Social Democrats party has said, claiming that “there is no health and safety reason for them.”
In a statement this week, party spokesperson on climate and biodiversity, Jennifer Whitmore TD, said that scrapping ‘best before’ date labels would “dramatically reduce food waste in Ireland,” and consequently help the climate.
“The reality is that one-twelfth of our greenhouse gasses are created by food waste, so this is making it more difficult for us to meet our climate action targets,” she said.
“At today’s meeting of the Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action, I pointed out that a million tonnes of food is thrown away in Ireland every year – 45 per cent of it because of the presence of best before dates,” she said.
“Best before dates are arbitrarily stamped on products by producers, with Safe Food Ireland saying there is no health and safety reason for them.”
Notably, Safe Food Ireland says on its website that:
“The ‘best before’ date tells us when the quality of the food will begin to get worse. This means that the food might begin to lose its flavour and texture after that date, but it would still be safe to eat.”
Many foods are technically safe to eat once past their “best before” date, but become stale, hard, or otherwise unpleasant to eat, such as biscuits, crackers, bread or chocolate.
Whitmore went on to say that producers are “unlikely” to voluntarily end the practice of including ‘best before’ dates on food products, because “it will hit their bottom line”, adding: “The more food is wasted, the more money they make.”
“For this reason, I believe that a mandatory approach to this issue is required,” she continued.
“There has been too much focus on educating consumers about their behaviour instead of putting the onus on producers to change their ways.
“Removing best before dates would be a simple thing to do. We should not need to set up groups or committees to achieve this.”