Tesco removes best before dates from fruit and veg to reduce food waste

UK supermarket Tesco has removed ‘best before’ labelling from fresh fruit and vegetables in a bid to tackle the country’s growing food waste problem.

Last year food waste charity WRAP estimated 1.9m tons of food is wasted by the food industry every year in the UK alone. Now one of the UK’s largest supermarket chains, Tesco, is removing ‘best before’ labelling from fresh produce to tackle the UK’s problem with food waste.

This means that shoppers will no longer find labels on products including own-brand apples, oranges, cabbages, and asparagus after a study, commissioned by the supermarket giant, recently revealed 69 per cent of customers believe scrapping best before dates is a good idea, with 53 per cent saying scrapping the labels will help them keep food fresh for longer.

At Tesco, we have no time for waste. That’s why we’ve removed the best before guidance from our fruit and veg – so you can decide when it’s past its best.

Find out more about this and our other #FoodWaste initiatives at https://t.co/uRuGSW3bgv pic.twitter.com/bNHjPqA67Q

— Tesco (@Tesco) October 3, 2018

Tesco’s Head of Food Waste Reduction, Mark Little, said: “Removing best before dates is our way of making it easier for customers to reduce food waste at home and save money in the process.

“It’s simply not right that food goes to waste and we’re going to do everything we can to help.”

‘Best before’ guidelines were designed to indicate a time to use products before they start to deteriorate, whereas the ‘use by’ label is to indicate safety. The Food Standards Agency says the ‘best before’ labels are about quality and not safety.