Full length articleQuantifying food loss along the animal products supply chain in China with large-scale field-survey based primary data
Introduction
Food loss and waste, as major sustainability obstacles, have raised enormous concerns in recent years due to their contribution to not only significant resource, climate, and environmental impacts (Bellemare et al., 2017; Kummu et al., 2012; Shafiee-Jood and Cai, 2016; Xue et al., 2021b) but also huge economic (Buzby and Hyman, 2012; Nahman et al., 2012; Philippidis et al., 2019) and nutritional impacts (Chen et al., 2020; Cooper et al., 2018; Spiker et al., 2017). For example, it was estimated that one-third of all food produced for human consumption worldwide is lost or wasted, costing approximately USD 1 trillion per year (Amicarelli et al., 2021; FAO, 2014). This would also mean that 1.4 billion hectares of land, 250 cubic kilometers of water, and one-fourth of fertilizers are wasted annually and roughly 44 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions were emitted in vain (FAO, 2011; FAO., 2013; Kummu et al., 2012; Scialabba, 2015). While various studies indicated that reducing food loss and waste could benefit food security and environmental sustainability (Lundqvist et al., 2008; Shafiee-Jood and Cai, 2016; Wang et al., 2017; Xue et al., 2021a), the extent of such benefits depends on the level of reduction and thus requires a good benchmark of the current loss and waste throughout the agri-food supply chain. Data availability and quality, however, have been widely identified as a key barrier for such a robust benchmark on food loss and waste, particularly for food loss in developing countries (Xue et al., 2017).
Food loss, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, refers to losses that occur along the food supply chain from agricultural production up to industrial transformation. Food waste, on the other hand, is defined as food lost during the final retailing and consumption stages (FAO, 2019, 2011). This distinction could also depend on human intentions; in other words, a “voluntary” or “by choice” behavior was defined as food waste, with moral implications, and involuntary behavior was considered as food loss, implying an unintended consequence (Garcia-Herrero et al., 2018). Although the absence of a uniform and standardized framework for measuring food loss and waste complicates the process of comparing and replicating studies (Amicarelli et al., 2020), food loss and waste patterns largely differ between industrialized and developing countries. In typical industrialized countries, about 24% of food loss and waste occurs at the harvest and post-harvest production stage, 23% from industrial transformation, 5% at the distribution stage, 9% from food services, and 39% from households (Amicarelli et al., 2022; Mc Carthy et al., 2018; Møller et al., 2014). On the contrary, in developing countries, more than 40% of food losses occur at the post-harvest handling and processing stage (FAO, 2011; Xue et al., 2017).
Regardless of the definitions used, compared to (household) food waste in industrialized countries, robust quantification on food loss in developing countries is less available; and most of existing data used either secondary sources (e.g., the FAO report (FAO, 2011)) or had a narrow focus on agri-food type (Liu et al., 2013; Lu et al., 2022). The lack of systematic approach (Xue et al., 2017) and lack of primary and robust data (Chaudhary et al., 2018; Xue et al., 2021b) have become main hurdles limiting the use of existing food loss evidence in decision making.
This data gap is particularly important for China, the world's major food producer and consumer with meanwhile a high level of food loss (Liu, 2014, 2013; Wang et al., 2017; Xue et al., 2021b). Approximately 349 million tons of food are lost or wasted in China each year, which represents 27% of its total food available for human consumption (Xue et al., 2021b) or about a quarter of the world's total food loss and waste (1300 million tons). The recent years have seen a few attempts to quantify supply chain food loss in China based on primary data (Lu et al., 2022; Luo et al., 2020). For example, we have reported our large-scale field-study based assessment for supply chain loss of staple food, vegetables, and fruits (Lu et al., 2022). However, there have been very few estimates based on primary data for food losses throughout the animal products supply chain.
Animal food (e.g., meat, aquatic, dairy products, and eggs) plays an increasingly important role in the diet of Chinese residents and ensuring food security. As the consumption of animal food continues to increase in China (He et al., 2018), understanding the scale of food loss for animal products supply chain and its role in addressing the already significant environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas emissions, water use, and land occupation, would be very important (He et al., 2018; Li et al., 2016; Liu and Savenije, 2008). Meanwhile, with the increase of animal food consumption, China's grain consumption for feed has accounted for about 50% of the total grain consumption, which may further increase the pressure on China to reduce grain food loss and ensure food security.
It is also important to point out that although food loss is often measured by physical weight or weight percentage (Cattaneoet al., 2021; Dou et al., 2016; FAO, 2011; Xue et al., 2021b), considering its nutrient contents such as energy, protein, and fat could further facilitate the measurement of the nutritional effects of food loss and waste (Chen et al., 2020). For example, it was estimated that the food loss recorded by FAO in 2017 was sufficient to feed about 940 million adults, a number exceeding the total quantity of undernourished people in the world (Abbade, 2020). The global average amount of food waste per capita per year contains nutrition that can fulfill the dietary recommended intake of 25 nutrients for one person for 18 days (Chen et al., 2020). Since animal products have relatively higher energy, protein, and fat contents, this nutritional perspective deserves special attention as well.
In this study, we aim at addressing the abovementioned animal food loss data gap based on first-hand data from a large-scale field survey in China. In brief, we have used a stratified sampling method to identify target enterprises or farms, used questionnaires for enterprise staff or farm operators, and conducted semi-structured one-on-one interviews with all stakeholders along the animal product supply chain (e.g., agricultural brokers, directors of enterprises or cold storage, and administrative staff). We have covered the entire supply chain of major animal products (i.e., meat, aquatic products, dairy products, and eggs) and typical production and marketing regions in China. In addition, we estimated the impact of animal food loss on the food supply and equivalent nutrition loss based on the use of feeding potential index.
Section snippets
Scope and system definition
Based on the definition of food loss and waste by the FAO, in this study, food loss refers to the reduction in the quantity of edible food for human consumption (excluding non-food uses such as feed and seed) resulting from human, technological, and mechanical factors in the production, post-harvest handling, storage, processing, and distribution of animal products (FAO, 2019, 2011).
Animal products we considered include red meat (pork, beef, and lamb), poultry, aquatic products, dairy products,
Results
Table 2 presents the food loss rates along the entire animal products supply chain by product by stage. The normalized total loss rate of meat was 6.4%, with the highest loss in distribution, accounting for 37.8% of the total loss, followed by loss in storage (22.5%). The high distribution and storage loss could relate to meat spoilage in the market since consumers prioritize fresh meat and juice loss during the thawing process. Specifically, the normalized total loss rates of pork, chicken,
Discussion
Our large-scale field survey provides, to our best knowledge, the first primary-data based overview on food loss along the entire supply chain of animal products for China, an important developing country with large animal products production and consumption. Table 4 presents the comparison of China's food loss rates of animal products at different stages from production to distribution with those of other countries. Compared with countries and regions such as the European Union, Saudi Arabia,
Concluding remarks
This study provides a first, primary data based estimate for food loss along the entire supply chain of animal products for China. Specifically, our results revealed that the normalized total loss rates of meat, marine products, dairy products, and eggs were 6.4%, 10.2%, 5.6%, and 4.1%, respectively, of their total production. Based on China's average production of meat, marine products, dairy products, and eggs between 2015 and 2019, the total losses would reach 4.9 million tons, 3.8 million
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Ruigang Wang: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Gang Liu: Conceptualization, Validation, Formal analysis, Writing – review & editing, Supervision. Lin Zhou: Methodology, Formal analysis, Writing – review & editing. Zhenni Yang: Formal analysis, Writing – review & editing. Zhenchuang Tang: Methodology, Formal analysis. Shijun Lu: Methodology, Formal analysis. Mingjun Zhao: Validation, Formal analysis. Huiwu Sun: Validation,
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
This work was funded by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China and The Agricultural Science and Technology Innovation Program (CAAS-ASTIP-2022A-3-IFND). We acknowledge the cooperation of interviewees from various companies and industry associations in our field study, with special thanks to the Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Bureau of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs for their support.
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Ruigang Wang and Gang Liu contributed equally to the research.