We are renowned for being a throw away society and that, it seems, is certainly the case when it comes to food.

While some families worry about where their next meal is coming from, others are prepared to throw away produce based on ‘best before’ dates through concern that the safety of what they consume may be affected.

In actual fact, ‘best before’ dates are based on quality rather than safety. Products should be consumed by their ‘use by’ dates.

However, confusion over labelling could be contributing to the global food wastage, which recently came under scrutiny in the report Global Food: Waste Not, Want Not.

The report claims as much as half of all the food produced in the world – two billion tonnes each year – ends up being thrown away.

According to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, the waste is caused by poor infrastructure and storage facilities, over-strict sell-by-dates, ‘get-one-free’ offers and consumer fussiness.

Each year, countries around the world produce some four billion tonnes of food, yet between 30 and 50 per cent of this total, amounting to between 1.2 and two billion tonnes, never gets eaten.

The report found up to 30 per cent of vegetable crops in the UK are not harvested because their physical appearance fails to meet the exacting demands of consumers. Half the food purchased in Europe and the US is thrown away after it is bought.

Dr Tim Fox, head of energy and environment at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, says “The amount of food wasted and lost around the world is staggering. This is food that could be used to feed the world’s growing population – as well as those in hunger today. It is also an unnecessary waste of the land, water and energy resources that were used in the production, processing and distribution of this food.

“The reasons for this situation range from poor engineering and agricultural practices, inadequate transport and storage infrastructure through to supermarkets demanding cosmetically perfect foodstuffs and encouraging consumers to overbuy through buy-one-get-one free offers.”

Keith Thomson, treasurer of Bradford Metropolitan Food Bank and Telegraph & Argus Enviro Watch columnist, believes the confusion over ‘best before’ dates could be impacting on global food wastage and he also believes consumers may be less likely to over-buy or throw away food if it was more expensive.

“We are all greedy now and it is a very serious matter. If food was more expensive we would be more careful about it,” suggests Keith.

“When I was a child during the war in the 1940s, 60 per cent of my mother’s income went on food, and only 20 per cent on rent for the house. The other 20 per cent went on whatever.”

Keith estimates people spend less than 15 per cent of their income on food, but he says because food is cheap we don’t value it. “And that is why we throw it away.”

With the unseasonable summer downpours and flooding damaging crops, it should prompt us all to think more carefully about food wastage.

Bradford-based supermarket chain Morrisons is certainly mindful of the situation. Its business model already supports farmers and being more flexible with their specifications has meant knobbly veg making its way on to the shelves.

“We source a lot of our produce directly from farmers. As you can imagine, the very challenging weather over the last year has meant we have been hearing regularly about the problems that they have had with crops,” says a Morrisons spokesman.

“What we try to do is buy British first. We know that is what our customers want and they want good value. The last thing we want to be doing is imposing price increases because of poor crop.”

He says they are tackling the issue by adapting their vegetable specifications. “In the case of some of the crops – potatoes and carrots – we buy the whole crop from them rather than saying we will take a portion based on those specifications.

“That means we will put the best specimens in our regular bags of potatoes and carrots and the ones that have been damaged or grown in a knobbly way will go into our Savers bags.”

Others are used in the products Morrisons manufacture, such as meat and potato pies or animal feeds reducing food wastage.

A spokesman for Keelham Farm Shop says they ensure food isn’t wasted by using it for their animals. “And the fact we don’t encourage our customers to buy wasteful amounts. We don’t have buy-one-get-one-free, and you can purchase one sausage and one carrot. It’s in the hands of the consumer rather than forcing it into peoples’ baskets and into peoples’ bins,” she says.

Keelham also work closely with the Bradford Food Bank supporting it at harvest time through a church collection.