Pandemic grocery overbuying is costing Canadians thousands — our food waste bill has just hit $2,000 a year per household

What's in your fridge? Chances are more food than you're actually going to eat, according to a new study showing Canadians are throwing out more food since the COVID-19 pandemic began.

A survey conducted by research firm Caddle for Dalhousie University's Agri-Food Analytics Lab found that Canadian households may be tossing an average of 13.5 per cent more food than they were before the pandemic. That adds up to 2.3 kilograms or just over five pounds of food per week.

Overbuying will produce 20 to 24 million kilograms of additional organic waste per month, according to the study, which surveyed 8,272 Canadians between August 21 to August 23, resulting in an annual cost of around $2,000 per household.

Prior to the pandemic, the dollar amount of wasted food was estimated to be $1,766, according to a 2019 study by Second Harvest and Value Chain Management International.

Domestic food waste is the bill you never receive but you have to pay for," said Sylvain Charlebois, a professor in food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University, who added people tend to under-report their own food waste.

Charlebois said it's possible that while Canadians are throwing out more of their grocery-store food, they are wasting less food overall by choosing to eat at home. This may account for why more than half of survey respondents said they believe they are wasting less food since the pandemic began.

Prior to the pandemic, around 40 per cent of every dollar spent on food in Canada went toward dining out, Charlebois said, but that fell below 10 per cent when COVID-19 hit.

According to a 2019 report by Environment and Climate Change Canada, food-service businesses like restaurants waste around 21 per cent of dairy, eggs and field crops; 38 per cent of produce; and 20 per cent of meat annually. So by eating out considerably less, Canadians' food-waste footprint is shrinking when it comes to restaurants, even if it's growing at home.

Our reasons for throwing out more food vary, but the study found most are rooted in poor planning behaviours, such as food being left in the freezer or fridge too long (31.3 per cent of respondents) or not consuming food before its best-before dates (15 per cent of respondents).

Some of this is due to panic-buying, said Charlebois, as well as a lack of experience and knowledge when it comes to planning meals and preserving food.

If you're not familiar with preparing your own food, cooking your own food, doing your own groceries ... it was challenging for a lot of people," he said.

We're kind of reconfiguring our relationship with food."

Despite the increase in waste, many Canadians are trying to waste less - 34.5 per cent of respondents said they are eating leftovers more often, and 22.5 per cent are canning, freezing or otherwise preserving more often. Some consumers are eating food that's past its expiration date more often, too, though some say they've actually been doing so less.

Charlebois said past-due dates are generally conservative estimates meant to protect companies from bad press and lawsuits, but many people treat them like law." Now, hoping to waste less, more people may be relying on their senses to judge whether a product is still good, he said.

Vegetables generate the most waste, said Charlebois, due to lack of meal planning by consumers combined with their perishability.

Fear may be another factor in the increase: one in 10 respondents said they have thrown out food believing it was contaminated by COVID-19. This number was highest in Quebec (14 per cent) followed by British Columbia (13 per cent). Canadians born after 1980 - millennials and Gen Z - were most likely to have thrown food away due to fear of contamination from COVID-19.

That's the big shocker for me," said Charlebois. You could see that really people aren't necessarily trusting of the science related to food safety and COVID."

The big question, of course, is whether any of these changed behaviours - not just more household food waste, but the increase in preserving, for example - will stick post-pandemic, said Charlebois.

He hopes to perform similar research in roughly a year's time to find out, though he does think people will get better at grocery planning and preserving as the months pass.

What's COVID's legacy in people's homes? That's really what we're wondering."

Rosa Saba is a Calgary-based business reporter for the Star. Follow her on Twitter: @rosajsaba