Food waste in the healthcare sector
Approximately 100 million tonnes of food is wasted annually in the EU across all stages of the food chain, and global food waste carries an estimated cost of approximately €630 billion.
To develop healthy and sustainable food policies in the healthcare sector, we must address the link between food procurement and food waste.
The MECAHF (Modèle d’Économie Circulaire Alimentaire pour les Hôpitaux Français) project, developed by Health Care Without Harm Europe in collaboration with the Centre Hospitalier de Niort in France, was developed to begin to address this problem. The project ran from 2018-2021 and aimed to purchase healthy and sustainable food products and raise awareness about food waste amongst patients and health professionals.