Retail food environment and household food waste: An empirical study

We examine the relationship between the retail food environment for individual households and household food waste. Conceptually the relationship is ambiguous and depends on how store access interacts with frequency, size, and the composition of food purchases. We use FoodAPS data to estimate the relationship between store proximity and household food waste. We measure this relationship for different retail food store formats and also investigate heterogeneity and mediating factors. We find that a 1% increase in the distance to the nearest small food store is associated with 0.02% more food waste among all households. A 1% increase in the distance to the nearest large food store – such as supermarkets and grocery stores – is associated with 0.05% more food waste among households in poverty, with larger associations among households without cars. We find that shopping frequency and size do not mediate the relationship between large food store proximity and food waste, but we find differences over the amount of fresh foods purchased on the average shopping trip. Among households that purchase large amounts of fresh foods per trip, greater distance to a large food store is substantially associated with more food waste. Our results contribute to policy discussions surrounding food waste as well as food access.