Frisch auf den Müll

More than half of our food lands in the dump! Most of it on the way from the farm to the store before it ever reaches our dining-room table: every other head of lettuce, every other potato, and one bread in five. In Europe alone, up to 100 million tons of food are thrown away year after year. That’s equivalent to about 3,000,000 truckloads each year – the queue would be as long as the equator – lorries one time around the world!

On a quest to find the causes Valentin Thurn speaks with supermarket managers, bakers, wholesale market inspectors, ministers, farmers and EU politicians. Everything is supposed to be available at all timesnd everything has to look just right: one withered leaf of lettuce, a crack in a potato or a dent in an apple – the goods are sorted out right away.

The very fact that half of the food already produced turns into trash has a disastrous effect on the world climate. Agriculture devours huge amounts of energy, water, fertilizers and pesticides. It is clearcutting the rain forest, and in sum total responsible for more than a third of greenhouse gases.

But there are other ways: Director Valentin Thurn finds people all over the globe who are trying to put a stop to this incredible waste. If we, the people living in industrial countries, were to reduce the waste of food by merely half, it would have the same effect on the world climate as if we refrained from half the cars.