Euro Coop praises EP plenary adoption of food waste report

BRUSSELS, 19 January 2012 – Euro Coop applauded the European Parliament for today’s adoption of the report “How to avoid food wastage: strategies for a more efficient food chain in the EU”, approved by a large majority in an important step towards dealing with food waste at EU level.

Euro Coop particularly welcomed the report’s recommendation for the EU Retail Forum on Sustainability, the European Food Sustainable Production and Consumption Round Table and the High Level Forum for a Better Functioning Food Supply Chain to further address the food waste problem.

Another high point was the European Parliament’s call to the Commission and Member States to promote a wide spectrum of information and education activities to raise awareness about food waste, echoing the consumer co-operative founding principles of education and training.

European consumer co-operatives, which are consumer-owned, democratically-controlled, values-based enterprises, have long recognized the food waste problem and have developed a broad set of solutions to address it, including the adoption of efficient order-supply chain management systems, optimised packaging solutions, the harmonisation of price reduction practices and co-operation with food redistribution programmes for citizens who lack purchasing power.

Euro Coop Secretary General Rodrigo Gouveia said, “Consumer co-operatives are committed to act at national as well as EU level to tackle the ethical, environmental and economic aspects of a food waste problem that has reached unacceptable levels, especially when compared to the many cases of undernourishment in the developing world.”

Euro Coop is comprised of the national organisations of consumer co-operatives in 18 European countries and represents the interests of over 4,500 local and regional co-operatives owned by a total of 30 million consumers across Europe, employing more than 450,000 people and accounting for €74 billion in annual turnover.

Euro Coop ID number in the European Commission register of interest representatives: 3819438251-87

For more information, please contact:

Rosita Zilli, Policy Adviser
Email: [email protected]
Tel: +32-2-285-00-72
Fax: +32-2-231-07-57