“The anti-waste shelves are supplies that we collected before”

The fight against food waste in supermarkets is progressing to the detriment, sometimes, of food aid. Associations are seeing their food collections decline.

We find more and more anti-waste sections in supermarkets, with for example yogurt or ham which will expire and are sold at knockdown prices. A boon for consumers in the face of inflation, except that it has a direct impact on the collection of food aid associations.

Franceinfo went to Arcueil, south of Paris, to one of the warehouses of the Banque Alimentaire d’Île-de-France. From 7 a.m., the teams, mostly volunteers, are on deck to sort and put away boxes filled with canned goods, packets of rice or pasta, or even crates of fruit and vegetables.

“Working hand in hand with all the stakeholders”

This food is intended for beneficiaries of more than 300 associations, who come to collect it on site. A quarter of what the Paris – Île-de-France food bank recovers comes from mass distribution. But between 2022 and 2023, quantities fell by 10%, explains Candice Thomas, supply manager. “For example, in large and medium-sized stores, we see anti-waste departments. These are potentially supplies that we recovered before and that we no longer have today. Afterwards, we will have manufacturers who manage better and better better their stocks, which means that we have a smaller supply of donations, notes Candice Thomas. There is this whole subject to explore and work hand in hand with all the players in the agri-food sector.”

There are also these intermediaries who appeared a few years ago. Applications allow you to collect baskets at half price, mechanically reducing the quantities intended for food aid while the number of people who need it increases.

Luc, a Red Cross volunteer for several years, confirms that collections are becoming more and more complicated. “In supermarkets, we manage to recover very little, a little bit of vegetables, but not much. And fresh, 4 kilos of meat, that’s the maximum. And even then, when we have them!” Less food therefore, and of less good quality too: “We can sometimes find yogurts, but on the date of the day, so they have to be distributed during the day. A few years ago, they gave them to us at 24 or 48 hours. That has changed a lot.”

“Rodent droppings” on food

Some foods that are too damaged cannot even be recovered, despite the obligatory agreements between the association and the store. Amine works for a solidarity grocery store in the town of Fresnes (Val-de-Marne) which had to suspend certain partnerships: “Either the date of the DLC [date limite de consommation] had passed, so there was a total ban on redistributing them, or the fruits and vegetables were sometimes in very poor condition. If you held an apple in your hand, it would crush. Sometimes, in terms of hygiene, it was very complicated, with rodent droppings or things like that. So we got away with more than 60% of what we collected in skips.”

And throwing it all away takes a lot of time. According to Ademe, the Ecological Transition Agency, this sorting represented 11 million hours of volunteering between 2022 and 2023. Ademe estimates that 16% of donations to associations end up in the trash. These discarded donations are however tax exempt, constituting 65 million euros in shortfall for the State.

Faced with these figures, the Minister of Ecological Transition, Christophe Béchu, recognized that the fight against waste in supermarkets also has perverse effects on food aid which had not been anticipated. Faced with what he described as “gaps”, it was supposed to bring together the different players – representatives of associations, mass distribution and anti-waste platforms – to try to improve things at the end of last year. But this meeting has still not taken place, indicates his ministry.

Large retailers deplore “individual cases”

The Federation of Commerce and Distribution explains that each store has the choice of selling or donating products that are getting closer to the use-by date. She recognizes that, during collections made by associations, “some stores take things a little less seriously” but let it remain “individual cases”, and that there should be more state controls.

This is also what the associations think. However, it remains difficult for them to do without mass distribution. The latter remains the leading supplier to food aid associations in France, with 38% of supplies according to the Federation of Food Banks, which is looking, like others, for new partners among farmers, at the local level for example.

Because distribution to the most precarious also has a quality issue. The government has released 60 million euros to improve the access of these food aid associations to healthier products, as part of the “Better eating for all” program. This program notably helped to set up an application to put stores that have unsold items in direct contact with associations.