Twenty of supermarket Pick n Pay’s biggest suppliers has joined the chain store in a new global project to combat food waste.

Backed by ten of the world’s largest food retailers and manufacturers, the initiative will focus on in-store and supply chain food loss and waste.

In the first phase of the initiative, named 10X20X30, the global retailers – including familiar names such as Carrefour, Tesco, Walmart and Ahold – are working to reduce in-store food waste. Pick n Pay and the other signatories have also committed to supporting their upstream suppliers to reduce their own loss and waste.

“As part of our commitment, we have asked 20 of our biggest suppliers to help us reduce food waste. We are eliciting their support and commitment to reduce waste in production and in the supply chain, and to better share information with us. I am calling on them to partner with us in this incredibly exciting initiative to help build a more sustainable world,” Pick n Pay chairperson Gareth Ackerman said.

This private-sector commitment is designed to be a significant step toward the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal Target 12.3, which calls for a 50% reduction in food loss and waste by 2030 worldwide.

“Reducing food waste is a global imperative, but it has added importance and urgency in Africa generally and in South Africa particularly,” Ackerman said, citing statistics that 13-million South Africans routinely experience hunger while 28% of South Africans are classified as obese, mostly from poor nutrition.

This, he added, is worth around R100-billion a year or about 2% of South Africa’s gross domestic product.

“Reducing food waste is a strong focus for Pick n Pay,” Ackerman said, highlighting that in 2015, the supermarket set goals to deliver significant shifts in waste reduction which includes diverting 20% of its food waste from going to landfill.

“We are getting more accurate in our procurement and replenishment, and we are steadily reducing the amount of food which goes to waste in our stores. Any food that has passed its sell-by date, but not its expiry date, is donated,” Ackerman said.

Pick n Pay’s donation of more than 1 600 t of food every year to non-governmental organisations reduces the supermarket’s carbon footprint by more than 5 000 t a year.

Pick n Pay aims to reduce its food waste by 50% by 2025. Which Ackerman pointed out sees the supermarket “edge ahead of the global target by five years”.