Food Waste in France

Food waste as a crime

France’s new legislation against food waste will serve to marginalize supermarkets who fail to abide. Penalties for failing to comply may result in fines up to €75,000 which translates into $83,000. Further, violators could see themselves facing up to two years in prison. In essence what this marks is cultural shift in perception that portrays supermarkets that waste food as criminals (Dvorsky, 2016). One criticism of this is that it fails to take consideration food waste at any other stage in production. Instead it inappropriately places a large amount of condemnation on supermarkets. In relative terms supermarkets contribute to only 11% of food waste (Martinko, 2016).

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