FAO Says India Leads on Post-Harvest Loss Data but Lags on Retail and Household Waste

The news

New Delhi. September 29 is the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste, and in The Hindu Konda Reddy Chavva, Officer-in-Charge of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) Representation in India, argues that cutting food loss and waste can give India a “triple win”: stronger food security and nutrition, less pressure on natural resources and emissions, and better incomes and productivity. Food loss means food that drops out of the chain between harvest and the shop, through poor storage, drying or transport; food waste means food discarded by shops, restaurants and households. India, he writes, produces enough to feed its 1.4 billion people yet loses a significant share across the value chain. It is the only country to have run three national post-harvest loss surveys: the Ministry of Food Processing Industries assessed 45, 45 and 54 commodities in 2005-07, 2012-14 and 2020-22, from farm to retail, and a fourth round is under way. These surveys support India’s reporting of the Food Loss Index under the Sustainable Development Goals, but they mainly cover farm and supply-chain losses; data on waste in retail, hotels, restaurants and households are far less developed. The scope for cutting losses, he writes, is greatest through better storage, drying, cooling, moisture management and processing, with digital traceability helping further. Assessments by the FAO and the Council of State Agricultural Marketing Boards (COSAMB) found that major wholesale markets can generate up to 100 tonnes of organic waste a day, and in some cities up to a fifth of all urban organic waste reaching landfills comes from them. Nationally this adds up to about 3.5 million tonnes a year which, if treated, could offset roughly 3.3 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent emissions annually, close to $30 million in carbon credits. A 50-tonne-a-day bio-CNG plant in Surat, run through a private partnership for over five years, reportedly cuts methane-related emissions by about 7,500 tonnes a year. The FAO and the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) are mapping food-loss hotspots to climate-resilient technologies such as drying, moisture control, efficient cooling and storage, with SIDBI arranging finance for small and medium enterprises. The FAO is also preparing a “Package of Practices” to help cities measure, prevent, reduce, redistribute and valorise waste across households, wholesale markets, retail and food service. His conclusion: India now has the data, technology and viable models, and must close data gaps, direct investment and build loss reduction into farm, food-processing, urban and climate policy. The syllabus link is GS3 on food processing, supply chain management and storage, and on food security.

Static syllabus linkage

1. SDG target 12.3 separates food loss from food waste and gives each its own index. Sustainable Development Goal 12 is about responsible consumption and production. Target 12.3 aims, by 2030, to halve per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels and to reduce food losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses. It is measured by two indicators: the Food Loss Index, for which the FAO is the custodian agency and which covers losses from after harvest up to but not including retail, and the Food Waste Index, for which the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is the custodian and which covers retail, food service and households. India’s three post-harvest surveys feed the first; the absence of household data is why the second is weak.
2. The International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste was created by the UN General Assembly. The United Nations General Assembly designated 29 September as the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste in 2019, and it was first observed in 2020. The FAO and UNEP lead its observance. It is distinct from World Food Day on 16 October, which marks the founding of the FAO in 1945. The FAO is headquartered in Rome.
3. India’s policy response has been built mainly around processing and cold chains. The Pradhan Mantri Kisan SAMPADA Yojana of the Ministry of Food Processing Industries is an umbrella scheme that funds mega food parks, integrated cold chains and value-addition infrastructure, agro-processing clusters and backward and forward linkages. Operation Greens, announced in the Union Budget of 2018-19, targeted price stability for tomato, onion and potato, the TOP crops, and was later extended to more perishable fruits and vegetables. The Agriculture Infrastructure Fund, launched in 2020, gives interest subvention on loans for post-harvest infrastructure such as warehouses and cold stores. These schemes address food loss; almost no national scheme addresses household food waste.
4. Waste-to-energy links food loss to climate policy. Organic waste decomposing in landfills produces methane, a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide over a short period. The SATAT initiative (Sustainable Alternative Towards Affordable Transportation) of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, launched in 2018, encourages compressed biogas plants that turn biomass and organic waste into fuel, and GOBARdhan supports similar plants from cattle dung and farm waste. The Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 require segregation of waste at source by households and bulk generators, which is the precondition for treating mandi and kitchen waste as a resource.

Why UPSC loves this

1. GS3 names storage, supply chains and food processing explicitly. The syllabus lists storage, transport and marketing of agricultural produce, food processing and related industries, and supply chain management. UPSC has asked about the constraints on food processing in India and the role of cold chains in reducing wastage. The FAO op-ed gives current, citable evidence: three national surveys, 3.5 million tonnes of mandi waste and a working bio-CNG model.
2. Prelims likes the distinction between custodian agencies and indicators. Questions on SDGs and international reports often test which agency publishes what. The difference between the FAO’s Food Loss Index and UNEP’s Food Waste Index, and the dates of international days, fit this pattern exactly.
3. Essay and GS3 answers on food security increasingly link it to climate. UPSC essay topics have touched on sustainability and consumption. A candidate who can show that reducing food loss is simultaneously food security, emissions reduction and farm income policy writes a stronger answer than one who treats them separately.

Analysis

1. India measures the loss it can blame on infrastructure, but not the waste it would have to blame on consumers. The three surveys cover farm to retail, where losses can be fixed by building cold stores and warehouses, which is the kind of project governments like to announce. Household and restaurant waste is harder: it needs behavioural change, municipal systems and data collection inside homes. That India leads the world on the first and lags on the second is not an accident but a reflection of what is politically easier. Until household waste is measured, India cannot credibly report half of SDG 12.3.
2. The mandi waste numbers turn a sanitation problem into an energy business. About 3.5 million tonnes of organic waste a year from wholesale markets is concentrated, relatively clean and predictable in quantity, which is exactly what a biogas plant needs. The Surat plant shows it can run for five years through a private partnership. The obstacle is not technology but institutions: agricultural produce market committees run mandis, municipalities run waste, and oil companies buy the gas, and none owns the problem fully. A model contract that assigns roles among them would do more than another subsidy.
3. The $30 million carbon-credit figure is modest, and that is a useful reality check. Offsetting 3.3 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent is worth close to $30 million a year, which is small against the cost of national infrastructure. Carbon finance will therefore not by itself pay for waste treatment. The real value lies in avoided landfill costs, the fuel produced and compost for soils. Presenting carbon credits as the main incentive risks disappointment; they are a supplement, not a business model.
4. Loss reduction is the cheapest way to raise effective food supply in a drought year. In a year when drought is shrinking the rabi prospect and pulse prices are rising, every tonne saved after harvest is a tonne that does not have to be imported. Better drying and moisture control for pulses and grains protect farmers from distress sales, because stored produce can wait for better prices. This makes post-harvest investment an anti-inflation tool, not merely an efficiency measure. The counter-view is that storage without market access only delays distress, so warehouses must come with warehouse-receipt finance.
5. Using grain for fuel raises the same question from the other side. A letter in The Economic Times asks for an immediate halt to the diversion of rice to ethanol, noting that about 65% of the population mainly eats rice, that India consumes about 145 million tonnes a year, and that 16 States have rainfall deficits of 15–40%. Whether diverting surplus grain to fuel is prudent depends on how large the surplus really is after a bad monsoon. The logic of food loss applies here too: food that leaves the food chain, whether into a landfill or a distillery, is food not eaten, and a drought year is when that trade-off should be reviewed.

Administrator's brainstorm