Globally, 40% of food is wasted. This is a scandal.

At a time of food inflation, hunger and poverty, we should be using our precious land to grow food to feed people and restore nature – not throwing it away.

Moreover, food waste causes about 10% of global emissions, driving climate crisis.

I’ve been fighting food waste for over a decade, and have seen the consequences of this – like truckloads of vegetables, rejected for being the wrong size and shape.

Now we have a major opportunity to tackle the UK’s food waste.

Up to 13 million tonnes of food are wasted in the UK every year, and about half of that food is wasted in businesses – on farms, in factories, shops and restaurants.

But there’s a big problem – businesses are keeping their food waste secret.

This means we have no idea how much food is actually wasted, and stops us meaningfully tackling it.

To break the deadlock, the government pledged to introduce a groundbreaking new food waste law to make businesses measure and publish their food waste.

This would be a big deal – causing a revolution in food waste transparency and setting a template for the world to follow.

But disgracefully, the government have u-turned and scrapped plans for this vital food waste law.

Despite 99% of consultation responses including the majority of businesses supporting the law, the government bowed to a minority of powerful business interests blocking progress.

So now we're building a movement to fight back - and we need your help!

Over the last decade, I've seen that despite huge public pressure for businesses to publish their food waste, voluntary reporting has failed.

Many businesses waste more food in a day than you or I do in a year, while people are going hungry in the UK, and people are dying on the frontlines of climate change.

Without this law, the big businesses causing waste can avoid responsibility, farmers suffer in silence as their food is rejected, and the food waste piles up.

We can’t go on like this.

We need action – save the food waste law!

Join us in calling on the UK government to:

- Make it a legal requirement for all large and medium* sized businesses to measure and report their food waste by 2024

- For this new law to cover all business sectors from farm to fork – including on farms, in manufacturing, retail, catering and restaurants.

Please sign and share this petition! Together, we can stop food waste!

*This law would only apply to businesses with more than 50 employees and annual turnover above £10.2 million - where the majority of waste occurs - smaller businesses would be exempt.