Script:
Anna: Hi, Robert.
Robert: Hi. Sorry I'm late. I was just printing off some pages about food waste in Britain.
Anna: Do you want to include Britain in the presentation? I thought we were concentrating on the USA?
Robert: Well, it is a global problem, so I thought we ought to provide some statistics that show that.
Anna: Fair enough. What did you find out?
Robert: Well, I was looking at a British study from 2013. It basically concluded that 12 billion pounds' worth of food and drink was thrown away each year - all of it ending up in landfill sites. Over eight million tons - and that wasn't including packaging.
Anna: An incredible amount.
Robert: Yes, and they were only looking at what households threw away, so there's no information about restaurants and the catering industry. But one thing the study did investigate was the amount of milk and soft drinks that were wasted, and I think it was probably quite unique in that respect.
Anna: Interesting. You know, in the other European reports I've read - there's one thing they have in common when they talk about carbon dioxide emissions.
Robert: I know what you are going to say. They never refer to the fuel that farms and factories require to produce the food, and the carbon dioxide that releases?
Anna: Exactly. We could really cut down on carbon emissions if less food was supplied in the first place. To my mind, the reports talk too much about the carbon dioxide produced by the trucks that deliver the fresh goods to the shops and take the waste away. They forget about one of the key causes of carbon dioxide.
Robert: Absolutely. If the reports are actually going to be useful to people, they need to be more comprehensive.
Anna: Who do you mean by 'people'?
Robert: Well, the government, industries ... people making television programmes. Have you seen any documentaries about food waste?
Anna: Not that I remember.
Robert: My point exactly. These days they all seem to be focusing on where your meat, fruit and vegetables are sourced from. We're being encouraged to buy locally, not from overseas. That's probably a good thing but I'd still like to see something about waste.
Anna: Yes, it's the same with magazine articles - it's all about fat and sugar content and the kind of additives and colouring in food - but nothing about how it reaches your table and what happens after it ends up in the bin.
Robert: Well, we've only got 15 minutes for this presentation, so I think we'll have to limit what we say about the consequences of food waste. What do we want to concentrate on?
Anna: Well, I know some of the other presentations are looking at food and farming methods and what they do to the environment, so I think we'll avoid that. And the fact that in some countries, people can't afford the food grown on their own farms - that was covered last term.
Robert: OK. We don't want to repeat stuff.
Anna: What concerns me above all else is that in a recession governments should be encouraging business to find ways to cut costs. Apparently supermarkets in the USA lose about 11% of their fruit to waste. That's throwing money away.
Robert: All right - we'll focus on that problem. It should get the others' attention, anyway. Now, how do you want to begin the presentation? Let's not start with statistics, though, because that's what everybody does.
Anna: I agree. How about we give the other students a set of questions to answer - about what they suspect they waste every day?
Robert: I'm fine with that. Probably a better option than showing pictures of landfill sites. It'll be more personalised, that way.
Anna: All right, now let's start ...
Choose correct answer about “Food Waste”.