Food waste prevention and economic incentives to redistribute surplus foods from food retailing

This study examines the economic mechanisms and incentives behind retailers' donation of surplus foods for charitable purposes, using Denmark as an illustrative case. Building on desk research, stakeholder interviews, estimated retail food prices and a systems theory framework - the study examines retailers' economic incentives to donate versus three alternative strategies for use of surplus foods for nine food categories. Generally, retailers' net costs of "in-store sale" are negative - and more negative than the other options, if the time until expiry is long enough to get the goods sold. For donation recipient organizations, the mean net value of donated food is positive except for liquid dairy products and dry foods. There is, however, also substantial variation in these estimated net costs and values. Donation is competitive in comparison with discard/nonfood use, except in the case of liquid dairy and dry foods, but not with sale on alternative platforms.