expiration date – Impact Lab

The Food and Drug Administration is going after food waste with a new effort to make sure we don’t throw out groceries until they’re absolutely inedible.

On Thursday, the agency issued a letter to the food industry at large, throwing its support behind a growing trend to almost universally adopt a “Best if Used By” date label on products. At the same time, it’s also reminding the public that most foods can still be perfectly safe to eat if they’re past the marked date, even if they’re not necessarily quite as tasty anymore. The moves are part of a larger effort by the FDA to drastically cut down on America’s food waste problem.

Continue reading… “The FDA Tells the Food Industry to Change How It Uses ‘Expiration’ Dates”

Most Americans are needlessly tossing out packaged food—not because it’s gone bad, but because they take the date stamped on it far too literally. That’s according to a recent study published in the journal Waste Management, which surveyed more than 1,000 people about the phrases and dates on food packages.

Many Americans wrongly believed that food product dates—often prefaced by “best by” or “sell by”—are federally regulated and indicate the point after which the food is no longer safe to eat. (Neither is true: labeling decisions are made voluntarily by food companies and are meant to help consumers determine how fresh a food is, according to the USDA.) As a result, 84% of people throw out food when it’s close to the package date at least occasionally, the researchers found.

Continue reading… “Confused by expiration dates? You’re not Alone. Here’s what they really mean”