Americans throw away almost a third of all edible food that they buy per year. That's almost 30 billion pounds (13 billion kg) of food a year, 11 billion (4 billion kg) of which are fruits and vegetables. On a day-by-day basis, that's about 1 pound (0.45 kg) of food per person per day. In the average family of four, that's a waste of about $600 US Dollars (USD) a year.

More facts about American eating habits:

• Seventeen percent of the trash that Americans send to landfills is food waste.


• Food banks report that 20 percent more people have come to them asking for food in recent years — but donations have gone down 9 percent. One study estimated that a mere 4 billion pounds (1.8 billion kg) of food would be enough to feed the hungry in America — that's less than one-fourth of what gets thrown out. About 40 million people in America do not have a regular source of food.


• Processing American food waste takes more than 350 million barrels of oil every year.

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