A new study from Ohio State University finds that freezing food is a highly effective way to reduce household food waste. With the holiday season approaching, researchers highlight the environmental and economic benefits of using your freezer to store leftover food.
As the holiday season approaches, a new study suggests that utilizing your freezer for holiday leftovers and cookies might significantly cut down on the escalating problem of household food waste in the United States.
The study, conducted by researchers from The Ohio State University and published in the British Food Journal, reveals that frozen items make up only about 6% of wasted household food in the country. This discovery points to a promising solution: encouraging the use of freezers to store food and thus prolong its edibility and reduce waste.
“We found that households with home freezing behaviors are more likely to have less food waste than other households,” first author Lei Xu, a postdoctoral scholar specializing in agricultural and food economics at Ohio State, said in a news release.
Food waste poses both economic and environmental challenges.
“Food waste is not just an economic loss — it also causes environmental damage because more than 90% of wasted food goes to the landfill, and this can produce greenhouse gas emissions,” added Xu.
Encouraging consumers to freeze their food could be a simple yet effective step towards tackling this issue.
“[T]his small change in food storage habits can have a large environmental impact,” Xu added.
Conducted in the summer of 2022, the U.S. National Household Food Waste Tracking Survey involved 1,067 households. The survey revealed that 85% of U.S. households buy frozen foods, with 55% of those shoppers purchasing these items specifically to reduce waste.
The study also highlights that meat, vegetables, potatoes and grains are the most commonly discarded frozen foods.
Interestingly, the research shows a significant association between frequent home freezing and reduced total food waste. Households most likely to engage in freezing fresh items or leftovers tend to be those with older individuals or households of three or more people, indicating a potential link to experience and meal management skills.
However, the study also uncovers a surprising trend. The amount of wasted frozen food discarded from refrigerator was about 30% more than that discarded from the freezer.
This suggests a gap in consumer knowledge regarding proper food storage, hinting at the need for more explicit food storage instructions on labels.
Efforts to educate consumers on the proper use of freezers for food storage could yield both economic and environmental benefits. Moreover, these practices could help mitigate food insecurity, which affects around 10% of U.S. households.
“Half of consumers buy frozen food to reduce waste. What about the other half?” Xu added. “We want to increase social awareness of how to save food, and explain how people use frozen food and home freezing techniques to save food. And freezing is one of the most accessible techniques because essentially all households have a refrigerator and freezer.”