In April, the Leeds Craftivists met to explore the topic of Food Waste. We watched a video of Leeds Food Waste legend Adam Smith who founded the Real Junk Food Project. You can watch the video here:
We then had a wonderful discussion about the complexities of food waste, projects we are involved with, our personal relationship with food waste and the change want to ask for.
We crafted over food packaging with information and inspiration for supermarkets to change their ways. We specifically spoke about best before/use by dates on food and the difference they make to the amount of food waste produced. Here are a few examples:
In the Leeds-Bradford area we have two major supermarket headquarters: Morrison’s and Asda. Morrison’s recently removed the “use by” date from much of their own brand milk so we wanted to celebrate that and encourage them to change the package design and also ask Asda to consider doing similar. We are also wanting to thank/ask for greater change on other elements of food waste e.g. wonky veg. Here are some example letters you could use if you want to take part in this campaign:
Don’t forget that we are also meeting in-person this month, on Wednesday 20 March at Left Bank Leeds during their Creative Takeover night. Find out more and how to register here.
Unfortunately, despite all the publicity recently about Morrisons changing the dates on their milk from use by to best before, giving the impression that they were doing this to reduce food waste, this still hasn’t happened. When I contacted Morrisons about this they said that they were waiting for the packaging to be redesigned! You would have thought that this should have been done before they publicised it.
Hi Penny, Thanks so much for letting us know. I will edit the letter to reflect this information. It explains why Sarah’s milk still had a ‘use by’ date on it.
Anna