Event Date: Friday, November 16, 2018
Developing and Testing a Novel Intervention to Reduce Household Food Waste
Paul van der Werf
Friday November 16
10am-11am
Social Science Room 6210
London households throw out $600/year of avoidable food waste, worth up to $100 million/year of lost food value. In the shadow of the City’s green bin implementation decision making process, a survey examined why people throw out food, which in turn informed a food waste reduction intervention.
A “Reduce Food Waste, Save Money” intervention, which combined elements of behavioral economics (nudging the desire to reduce monetary loss) and the theory of planned behavior (strengthening perceived behavioral control), was developed and tested. Treatment household food waste disposal decreased by 31% and this was significantly greater than for control households.
This research is contributing to national, provincial, and municipal food waste reduction policy. In London it is being used to help develop a ‘smart’ green bin program.
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