Research on on food waste is often reductionist, in that it attempts to measure food waste at single points within the supply chain. While this enables consideration of where food is being wasted within the supply chain, it does not necessarily answer why and how food is wasted across an entire supply chain. Using a paradox theory approach, the aim of this paper is to address these knowledge gaps by exploring the inherent paradoxes in resolving food waste across a supply chain. Drawing on in-depth qualitative research within the Australian horticulture industry, the findings reveal four macro-level paradoxes relating to policy, markets, responsibility, and marketing. This paper makes a novel contribution through consideration of a holistic, whole of chain perspective in relation to food waste. It also extends paradox theory into food waste scholarship. From a managerial perspective, the visibility of paradoxes highlights the need for organisations in the food supply chain to look beyond their own organisational boundaries and adopt a whole-of-chain approach in an attempt to address food waste.

关于食物浪费的研究通常是减少主义的，因为它试图在供应链中的各个点测量食物浪费。尽管这可以考虑在供应链中浪费了哪些食品，但并不一定能回答原因和方式食物浪费在整个供应链中。本文采用悖论理论方法，旨在通过探索解决供应链中食物垃圾的内在悖论来解决这些知识差距。通过对澳大利亚园艺业的深入定性研究，研究结果揭示了与政策，市场，责任和市场营销有关的四个宏观悖论。本文通过考虑与食物浪费有关的整体，整体链的观点，做出了新的贡献。它还将悖论理论扩展到了食物浪费奖学金。从管理的角度看，悖论的可见性突出表明，食品供应链中的组织需要超越自身的组织边界，并采用全链方法来解决食品浪费。