Countries That Waste the Most Food (2025 Ranked)

Approximately 1.05 billion tonnes of food are wasted at the consumer level every year — that is one in every five meals prepared on Earth, discarded uneaten. Add pre-consumer food loss in production, storage, and distribution, and the total climbs to an estimated 2.5 billion tonnes. That waste drives 8–10% of global greenhouse gas emissions, uses 28% of the world's agricultural land, and persists while 783 million people go chronically hungry. Here is what the data shows about who wastes most, why, and what actually works.

Key takeaways

• Australia generates the most food waste per capita (312 kg/person/year), followed by the US (247 kg) and Canada (237 kg).
• The UNEP Food Waste Index 2024 found that 1.05 billion tonnes of food was wasted at consumer level in 2022 — equivalent to 132 kg per person globally.
• Households account for 60% of consumer-level food waste globally; food service and retail account for the remaining 40%.
• High-income countries dominate consumer-level food waste; low-income countries suffer disproportionate loss in production, storage, and transport.
• France passed the world's first supermarket food waste ban (2016) — the model that others including Italy, Denmark, and the Czech Republic have followed.

How food waste is measured — the methodology

The authoritative source for global food waste data is the UNEP Food Waste Index Report, most recently updated in 2024 with data from 2022. The report uses three data tiers:

• Tier 1: Primary waste composition studies (waste diaries, direct household measurement) — highest quality
• Tier 2: Secondary analysis of existing national waste data
• Tier 3: Modelled estimates from comparable countries — lowest certainty

The 2024 report achieved 288 datapoints across 102 countries, a major improvement over the 54 datapoints in the 2021 edition. However, data quality remains uneven: high-income countries have Tier 1 or Tier 2 data; many low-income countries rely on Tier 3 modelling.

An important distinction runs through all food waste data:

Food loss refers to food that never reaches consumers — it spoils in fields, storage facilities, or transport. This is the dominant problem in low-income countries with inadequate infrastructure.

Food waste refers to edible food discarded at retail, food service, or household level. This is the dominant problem in high-income countries and the focus of most consumer-facing policy.

The per-capita figures in the ranking below refer to consumer-level food waste only and exclude supply-chain loss — meaning low-income countries' actual total food waste problems are larger than their position in this table suggests.

Source: UNEP Food Waste Index Report 2024, published March 2024.

Countries that waste the most food per capita

(kg food waste per person per year, consumer level)

Rank	Country	Waste/person/year	Total food waste	Notes
1	Australia	312	7.6 Mt	High income; large portions; over-purchasing
2	United States	247	80 Mt	$408 billion value; mostly household
3	Canada	237	9 Mt	—
4	Israel	191	1.8 Mt	—
5	New Zealand	190	0.9 Mt	—
6	United Kingdom	180	12 Mt	—
7	Germany	178	15 Mt	—
8	Sweden	171	1.7 Mt	—
9	Netherlands	165	2.9 Mt	—
10	Denmark	162	0.9 Mt	—
15	France	155	10 Mt	Improving due to legislation
20	Japan	130	17 Mt	Above average despite food culture
30	China	91	129 Mt	Large absolute amount; moderate per capita
40	India	50	69 Mt	Mostly supply chain loss; post-harvest
50	Nigeria	45	10 Mt	Storage losses dominant
60	Ethiopia	30	3.5 Mt	Post-harvest storage loss

The UNEP 2024 report also found that hotter countries tend to generate more food waste per capita in households — driven by higher consumption of fresh foods with substantial inedible parts (fruit skins, husks, bones) combined with weaker cold chain infrastructure that accelerates spoilage.

Source: UNEP Food Waste Index Report 2024; WRAP UK Food Waste Report 2023; ReFED US Food Waste Report 2024.

Where this data comes from

All per-capita rankings in this article are drawn from the UNEP Food Waste Index Report 2024, which analysed 102 countries using primary waste measurement studies, secondary national data, and modelled estimates. The 2024 edition marks a major improvement over previous reports, with nearly 300 data points compared to only 54 in 2021. Important caveat: high-income countries contribute the highest-quality primary data (direct household measurement); lower-income countries rely more heavily on modelled estimates. Additionally, these figures capture consumer-level waste only — low-income countries experience far larger losses at the production and supply chain stages, which this ranking does not fully represent. The per-capita figures should be understood as a proxy for waste-aware consumer behaviour and retail system efficiency, not as a complete picture of each nation's food loss problem.

A brief history of food waste as a policy concern

Food waste has always existed, but it became a defined policy target only in the 21st century.

Pre-industrial societies had strong structural disincentives to waste: food was expensive relative to income, preservation was difficult, and cultural traditions around food (nose-to-tail eating, pickling, fermenting, drying) developed partly in response to the need to extend shelf life. A medieval European household wasted little — not from virtue but from material necessity.

Industrial agriculture disrupted these incentives. As the real cost of food fell through the 20th century — from roughly 30–40% of household income in the 1950s to 10–15% in wealthy countries today — the rational calculus of waste shifted. Food became cheap enough that discarding some was economically preferable to the time cost of using it optimally.

Supermarket cosmetic standards formalised a new layer of waste at the supply chain level. Retailers developed size and appearance specifications — straight cucumbers, unblemished apples, uniform tomatoes — that rejected 20–30% of harvested produce before it reached consumers. This "ugly produce" problem was essentially invisible to consumers but enormous in scale.

The 2030 Agenda put food waste on the international policy map. Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 calls for halving per-capita global food waste at retail and consumer levels by 2030, and reducing food losses along production and supply chains. The UNEP Food Waste Index reports track progress against this target — so far, most countries are off track.

Source: FAO, Food Wastage Footprint: Impacts on Natural Resources (2013); UN SDG 12.3 Progress Report 2024.

Why Australia wastes so much

Australia's 312 kg per capita — the world's highest — reflects structural factors across the supply chain, retail environment, and household behaviour.

Supermarket cosmetic standards: Australian supermarkets historically rejected produce that was misshapen, wrong size, or wrong colour but perfectly edible. An estimated 20–25% of fruits and vegetables were discarded before reaching store shelves. Woolworths and Coles have both made public commitments to reduce cosmetic standards, but progress has been uneven.

Oversized packaging: Retail packaging is typically designed for households of four, while Australian cities have among the world's highest proportions of one- and two-person households. A couple buying a 500g bag of spinach because the 250g option is not available will waste a different amount than a family of four buying the same product.

Aspiration-versus-reality shopping: Research by FIAL (Food Innovation Australia Ltd) found that Australian consumers consistently overestimate how much fresh food they will cook at home. Aspirational meal planning ("I'll make that Thai salad on Wednesday") combined with busy schedules produces refrigerators full of decaying produce.

Positive composting culture: Australia has relatively high rates of home composting and council green-waste collection. Some of Australia's high "food waste" figure reflects food that is composted — which is a far better outcome than landfill but still represents food produced and not eaten.

Policy progress: Australia's National Food Waste Strategy (2017) set a target of halving food waste by 2030. A 2022 review found meaningful progress in the hospitality and food manufacturing sectors, but household waste reduction remained behind target.

Source: FIAL National Food Waste Strategy Feasibility Study 2021; Stop Food Waste Australia 2023 Progress Report.

The United States food waste crisis

The United States wastes approximately 80 million tonnes of food annually — a retail value of around $408 billion, or roughly $1,500–1,800 per household per year. That economic figure, more than the environmental one, has been the most effective lever for changing corporate behaviour.

The waste breaks down across the supply chain:

Sector	Share of US food waste
Households	43%
Food service (restaurants, canteens)	40%
Retailers	13%
Manufacturers	2%
Other	2%

Household waste is dominated by four behaviours:

Over-purchasing: Bulk-buy culture, BOGO (buy one, get one) promotions, and large portion-size defaults drive consumers to buy more than they use. The US retail model is built around unit economics that favour larger package sizes.

Date label confusion: A 2013 NRDC report found that the majority of Americans throw away food prematurely because they misread "best before" labels as mandatory safety dates. "Best before" is a quality indicator — the manufacturer's estimate of peak flavour — not a food safety deadline. Only "use by" dates on some products carry safety implications. This single misunderstanding is estimated to drive 20% of household food waste.

Improper storage: Knowing that berries last three days in the front of the refrigerator versus two weeks in the crisper drawer is not common knowledge. The USDA's FoodKeeper app addresses this directly, but awareness remains low.

Over-preparation: Cooking for the number of people expected, then adjusting for no-shows, appetite changes, or restaurant substitutions produces the classic "leftovers nobody eats."

Source: ReFED Roadmap to Reduce US Food Waste 2021; NRDC Wasted Report 2013 (revised 2017); USDA Economic Research Service food loss data.

France's legislative approach — the model that works

France passed Law 2016-138 on February 11, 2016 — the world's first law directly prohibiting supermarket food waste.

Key provisions:

• Supermarkets above 400 m² are legally required to sign agreements with food banks or charities to donate unsold but edible food.
• Destroying edible food — including via deliberate contamination or bleaching to prevent salvage — became illegal.
• Violation is subject to fines of up to 0.1% of annual revenue.

In the five years following the law, French food banks reported a 22% increase in donated food from supermarkets. The law was subsequently extended to restaurants with more than 180 seats (required to offer doggy bags from 2020) and to catering companies from 2025.

France's model works because it shifts the default: instead of a supermarket choosing to donate food (voluntary, easy to deprioritise), the law makes donation the mandatory option and destruction the illegal one. The policy design is more elegant than a pure fine system — it creates value (donated food reaches food banks) rather than merely imposing costs.

Several countries have followed:

• Italy (2016): Tax incentives for food donation, simplified donation procedures — a softer version that still produced measurable increases in food bank receipts.
• Denmark (2016): Government-business coalition "Stop Wasting Food" combined with Tier 2 legislation.
• Czech Republic (2018): Mandatory donation for supermarkets above 250 m².

The UK's approach has been voluntary and campaign-based (WRAP's Courtauld Commitment), achieving a 31% reduction in household food waste per capita since 2007 — demonstrating that voluntary coordinated action can produce results at scale, though it requires sustained institutional commitment.

Source: French Ministry of Ecological Transition, Law 2016-138 implementation report 2022; WRAP Courtauld Commitment progress data 2023.

Supply chain food loss in developing countries

In low-income countries, the food waste problem is structurally different — and in aggregate, larger.

Post-harvest losses of 20–40% are common in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Food rots in fields, in transport, and in inadequate storage before it can reach urban markets. The causes are specific and addressable:

Storage infrastructure: Traditional open-air grain storage allows moisture, insects, and rodents to degrade produce. Hermetically sealed PICS bags (Purdue Improved Crop Storage) cost approximately $2–3 each and reduce post-harvest grain loss from 20–30% to under 2%. Adoption is growing but remains far from universal.

Cold chain gaps: Vegetables and fruit that require refrigeration from field to consumer are particularly vulnerable. A tomato harvested in rural Kenya may travel 8–12 hours in an open truck before reaching a Nairobi market — half may be unsaleable on arrival. Cold chain investment (refrigerated trucks, rural cold stores) dramatically reduces this loss but requires significant capital.

Road and market access: Many smallholder farmers in remote areas cannot access markets efficiently. High transport costs relative to crop value mean some harvests are left in the field when prices fall, or take so long to reach market that they spoil in transit.

The economic impact on farmers is severe: a smallholder losing 30% of their harvest to post-harvest loss before selling is effectively losing 30% of their income. Solutions are known and relatively inexpensive at the household scale — the constraint is deployment infrastructure, not technology.

Source: FAO Reducing Food Loss and Waste in Low-Income Countries (2019); World Resources Institute Creating a Sustainable Food Future report 2019.

The climate mathematics of food waste

If food waste were a country, it would be the world's third-largest greenhouse gas emitter — after the US and China, ahead of India.

The emissions come from multiple stages:

Agricultural production: Growing crops requires land (including land cleared from forests), fertiliser (nitrogen fertiliser production is energy-intensive), water (irrigation is often energy-powered), and machinery. When that food is wasted, all those embedded emissions are wasted too.

Landfill decomposition: Food waste in landfill produces methane — a greenhouse gas approximately 80 times more potent than CO₂ over a 20-year period. Landfill methane from food waste is a significant component of global methane emissions.

Land use opportunity cost: Land used to grow food that is wasted cannot simultaneously sequester carbon through forest or grassland. The UNEP estimates that food systems account for approximately 33% of global emissions; reducing waste is one of the highest-leverage interventions within that system.

The UNEP Food Waste Index 2024 calculates that halving global food waste by 2030 (the SDG 12.3 target) would reduce annual emissions by approximately 1.5 billion tonnes of CO₂ equivalent — comparable to eliminating all aviation emissions globally. Unlike most climate solutions, it requires no new technology, only behavioural and institutional change.

Source: UNEP Food Waste Index Report 2024; Project Drawdown, Reduce Food Waste solution brief (2023).

What actually reduces food waste — the evidence

Research across multiple countries identifies several interventions with measurable impact:

Legislation (strongest evidence): France's mandatory donation law produced a 22% increase in food bank receipts. South Korea's pay-as-you-throw system (households pay per kg of food waste disposed) reduced residential food waste by 30% over a decade.

Date label standardisation: The EU standardised date labelling in 2022, restricting "best before" labels to products where quality (not safety) is the concern, and reserving "use by" for safety-critical products. The UK's WRAP estimates that date label standardisation alone could prevent 350,000 tonnes of food waste per year in the UK.

Supermarket default changes: Studies show that removing buy-one-get-one-free promotions on fresh produce, offering smaller package sizes without price penalty, and prominent in-store messaging about food waste reduces purchase over-buying measurably.

Consumer education: Japan's "mottainai" (waste-nothing) cultural norm and the country's structured approach to portion sizing at retail contribute to Japan's 130 kg/capita figure — above world average, but notable for a high-income country with expensive food.

Technology: Apps like Too Good To Go (connects consumers with restaurants selling surplus food at discount), Winnow (AI-powered food waste tracking in commercial kitchens), and Olio (neighbourhood food sharing) are growing in user base and measurable impact, though their current scale is small relative to the total problem.

Source: South Korea Ministry of Environment Pay-As-You-Throw Evaluation 2022; WRAP UK Date Label Impact Assessment 2023; Too Good To Go Impact Report 2024.

Frequently asked questions

Q: Does food waste really affect climate change? A: Yes, significantly. UNEP estimates that if food waste were a country, it would be the world's third-largest greenhouse gas emitter. The emissions come from land cleared to grow food that is wasted, from agricultural inputs used in that food's production, and from methane produced when food waste decomposes in landfill. Reducing food waste is among the highest-leverage, lowest-cost climate interventions available — it requires no new technology.

Q: Is "ugly produce" actually edible? A: Completely. Cosmetically imperfect vegetables are nutritionally identical to standard-grade produce. The cosmetic standards are entirely market-driven — retailers select for visual consistency because consumer research shows preference for uniform appearance when there is no price difference. Several direct-to-consumer businesses (Imperfect Foods in the US, Oddbox in the UK) have built viable markets delivering cosmetically imperfect produce at 20–40% discounts, demonstrating that consumers will accept variation when given a price or environmental incentive.

Q: What is the most effective way to reduce personal food waste? A: Research consistently identifies meal planning before shopping as the highest-impact single behaviour change, because it addresses over-purchasing — the root cause of most household waste. Beyond that: storing older items at the front of the refrigerator (FIFO — first in, first out), understanding that "best before" dates are quality guidance not safety deadlines, freezing food approaching its date, and composting unavoidable waste to divert it from landfill methane production.

Q: How much does household food waste cost per family? A: In the US, approximately $1,500–1,800 per year for a family of four (ReFED 2021 estimate). In the UK, approximately £600–800 per year (WRAP 2023). For individual households, the economic case for reducing food waste is substantial and immediate — unlike many sustainability behaviours, it directly saves money.

Q: Is Japan's low food waste per capita due to cultural factors? A: Partly. Japan's "mottainai" concept (regret over unnecessary waste) provides cultural context, and Japanese portion sizing at retail is smaller and more calibrated than Anglo-American norms. But Japan's figure (130 kg/capita) is still above the global average of 132 kg/capita — meaning Japan is not an outlier it is sometimes portrayed as. The UK's 31% reduction in food waste since 2007 through the WRAP/Courtauld process suggests culture can change quickly with the right institutional support.

Q: Can food banks solve the food waste problem? A: Food banks are a useful part of the system but cannot absorb the scale of available food surplus. The US wastes 80 million tonnes annually; US food banks distribute approximately 6 billion pounds (2.7 million tonnes) per year. The mismatch in scale means food banking, while valuable, addresses less than 5% of the waste stream. Upstream waste prevention — not producing, buying, or cooking food that won't be eaten — is far more effective at scale.

The takeaway

One-fifth of all food prepared reaches a bin rather than a stomach — a number that sits alongside 783 million chronically hungry people without any logical reconciliation. The good news is that solutions are proven and not expensive. France's supermarket waste law demonstrates that legislation delivers where voluntary commitments don't. South Korea's pay-as-you-throw system shows households respond to economic signals. The UK's Courtauld Commitment demonstrates that coordinated voluntary action can achieve 30% reductions at national scale. What is missing is not technology, not knowledge, and not money — it is political will to apply at scale what we already know works.

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