Better Food Dating System On Labels Could Save Billions of Dollars

U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) (C) gets a laugh from Steve Armstrong, Chief Food Law Counsel Campbell Soup (L), and Ona Balkus, Senior Clinical Fellow, Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic (R) when he assures Armstrong that his family has a long tradition of using Campbell products. Blumenthal announced new legislation to reform and streamline confusing and misleading food date labels that contribute to the waste of 160 billions of pounds of food each year, driving up consumer costs and filling landfills with perfectly edible food. The press conference was held at Stew Leonard's on the Berlin Turnpike Thursday afternoon. 

 (John Woike / Hartford Courant)

Gregory B. Hladky Contact Reporter

Do you always throw away food that's past its "use by" or "sell by" date?

NEWINGTON — New federal food labeling standards to let consumers know how long food can actually be safely eaten would save billions of dollars in usable food that's now being thrown away, said a panel of experts who gathered at a Stew Leonard's store on Thursday.

Food bank officials, environmentalists, academics and food industry representatives met to support U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal's new legislation aimed at establishing a uniform federal food dating system.

Blumenthal said the current hodgepodge of state laws and regulations on food dating has created confusing labels "that fail to reflect what consumers think they mean." Legislation similar to the bill Blumenthal is proposing has already been submitted in the U.S. House, and he said both measures face an "uphill fight" in an often-gridlocked Congress despite expected food industry support.

Experts said such date terms as "use by" or "sell by" and "expires on" that are now often required by states for food labels have little to do with food safety and have produced such confusion that an estimated 90 percent of Americans throw away still-edible food.

Blumenthal cited studies indicating that more than 160 billion pounds of perfectly good food is thrown away in the U.S. each year.

According to Blumenthal, discarding still usable food costs the average American family an estimated $1,500 annually. Much of that discarded food could be donated to food banks and shelters to help America's hungry, experts said.

U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) will announce new legislation to reform and streamline confusing and misleading food date labels that contribute to the waste of 160 billions of pounds of food each year, driving up consumer costs and filling landfills with perfectly edible food.

Ona Balkus, a senior clinical fellow with the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic, said all that wasted food is filling up landfills and resulting in the production of methane gases that add to environmental climate change. Other experts said an estimated 25 percent of fresh water in the U.S. is used to grow food that is eventually wasted.

James Arena-DeRosa, president of Foodshare of Hartford and Tolland Counties, said the existing "patchwork of laws" in different states and confusion over differing regulations have made food companies wary of donating lots of food. "Millions and millions of pounds of food are being wasted," he said.

Steve Armstrong, chief food law counsel for Campbell Soup, said his company and many others in the food industry fully support "uniform national standards" for food dating. He said such a system would benefit consumers, food manufacturers and the nation's grocery stores, as well as food banks for the poor.

"Donating food is a tricky one for everyone in the food industry," Armstrong said, citing conflicting state regulations about how long an unsold food item can be safely given away to food banks.

"We welcome science-based regulation," Armstrong said. He said he hasn't done any actual surveys, but his instincts tell him there would be strong support throughout the food and grocery industries for the kind of bill Blumenthal wants.

Blumenthal said he believes a lack of consumer understanding about the problems with the current system has contributed to the failure in Congress and the federal government to reform food dating.

Although he always considered himself a pretty savvy consumer in the past, Blumenthal said he, too, was guilty of discarding perfectly edible food. "I can't tell you how many cartons of milk and cantaloupes I've discarded," believing they were past their "sell by" or "use by" dates, Blumenthal said.

Armstrong said federal officials at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been far more focused on food safety issues and preventing food-related illness than on food label dating.

Connecticut is one of four states with laws aimed at requiring businesses that send large amounts of discarded food to landfills to seek better alternatives, including donations to food banks and composting operations.

Blumenthal's new bill would require food industry manufacturers and retailers that use a date on labels to indicate quality to use the term "best if used by." A study by Wal-Mart found that was the term most easily understood by consumers looking to know how long a food would actually taste good.

The legislation would also require that "high-risk foods," such as deli meats or hot dogs, have an "expires on" date on their label to clearly indicate when such foods should not be eaten. The bill would also require federal food regulators to create a specific list of "high-risk foods" that shouldn't be consumed after a certain date.