Our mission

From our articles of association:

"Best Before Project is a Not for Profit Organisation established for the benefit of the community aims to enhance the knowledge of the general public in relation to the date marks on food labels in order to prevent food waste caused in particular but, not exclusively about the food being wasted in the UK due to the misinterpretation of "best before" date labelling, by raising awareness of the current legislation among the consumers and by providing information to wholesalers and retailers in order to convince them to sell or donate food that has past its "best before" date with the purpose to benefit the public and the environment by reducing food wastage."

So, we put our efforts in:

1. Raising public awareness regarding the amount of food being wasted because of the misinterpretation of "best before"

2. Promoting environmental improvement by educating, encouraging and assisting the local business, charities and people in environmental practices and working in partnership with similar groups and organisations with the common aim to reduce food waste.

3. Setting up, maintaining and expanding a regional and local collection and redistribution network for food that is approaching or has passed its “best before” date that would otherwise be sent to landfill, thereby helping to tackle the problem of waste and reducing its environmental impact.

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Our organisation is about food and hunger, about misinterpretation and waste, about overproduction and its consequent environmental and social impact.

Vast amounts of perfectly good food are being thrown away by food businesses and consumers alike because of a simple misunderstanding - food approaching or past its ‘best before’ date is safe to consume and legal to distribute.

UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and UK Food Standards Agency:

‘Best before’ will be appropriate for the vast majority of foods and indicates the period for which a food can reasonably be expected to retain its optimal condition (e.g. it will not be stale) and so relates to the quality of the food. (...) ‘Best before’ dates relate to food quality, including taste, texture, aroma and appearance, whilst ‘use by’ relate to food safety. (...) It is not an offence to sell food after the ‘best before’ date relating to it, provided it still complies with the Food Safety Act 1990 and the General Food Regulations 2004. (...)’

The Problem's numbers

In here we are considering the food distributors’ waste in the UK, according to the statistics quoted by DEFRA in 2011, plus the amounts of food wasted due to misinterpretation of food labels (according to BBP data on average amounts of food collected from suppliers, wholesalers and retailers):

- wholesalers: 15326 x 20 tons a year / 1.67 tons a month each = 306520 tons

- retailers: 91509 x 1.3 tons a year / 0.11 tons a month each = 118961.7 tons

total: 425481.7 tons

Number of people that could potentially be fed:

1 ton = 1000 kg: 2.5 kg (approximate daily amount of food + drinks consumed) = 400 daily rations

1000 tons = 400 x 1000 = 400 000 daily rations: 365 days = 1096 people fed every day all year round

420 000 tons = 420 x 400 000 daily rations = 168 000 000 daily rations: 365 days = 460 274 people fed every day all year round

The above calculations are based on our experience to date, in 2012, and have indicated any significant increase in the following years.