Groups fighting against food waste are calling for “best before” dates to be scrapped on products sold in Australia to rein in the amount of food that gets binned every year.
The organisations claim the move would save billions each year in wasted food, as well as help household budgets.
Experts say a lot of wastage comes down to many Australians not knowing the difference between “use by” and “best before” dates.
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Associate Professor Simon Lockrey, from the Fight Food Waste Co-operative Research Centre, told 7NEWS that retiring some best-before dates “makes sense”.
“The big difference really is that expiry dates are where you need to throw the food out for a safety concern,” he said.
“Best before dates are a suggested date on quality.”
In Australia, about 7.6 million tonnes of food is estimated to be wasted each year.
This equates to about $2500 worth of wasted food per household annually.
“The really startling fact is that about 70 per cent of that household food waste is perfectly edible,” Michaela Windsor from OzHarvest said.
“So many beautiful foods might be a little squishy, a little soft, but they’re still great to use up in curries or in a bolognese.”
However, only Food Standards Australia can change the guidelines on use buy and best before dates, and currently, they say they have no plans.
Experts say Australians can save money and prevent food wastage by marking items that need to be used and using their own judgement to decide if food is still fit to eat.