Needless to say, we agreed to it immediately.

The talk was scheduled on 12 and 13 April for the lower and upper secondary school students respectively. As much as we were excited, it was quite intimidating to speak to hundreds of students at one go.

Lower secondary students on Day 1

But looking on the positive side of things, if we can survive speaking in front of a few hundred students, surely we will survive speaking to four moderators (professors) during our FYP presentation. (FYI: We did survive, pics will come in the next entry).

The talk was also the prefect chance for us to present a short film titled ‘Chicken ala carte’ by Ferdinand Dimadura.

What’s the significance you may ask. Well this was the very film that help us identify the issue of food wastage as a possible topic for FYP. I strongly encourage you to take a look at this video if you do not have time to read all the stuff on this website.

Ok, back to the topic. Here’s some more photos to share.

For more photos, do visit our Facebook page.

Suffice to say, we were excited when Lian He Zao Bao, Singapore’s most popular Chinese newspaper calls and decided to run a feature on us and our topic. We were quick to respond to the reporter’s questions and sent in some photos for their consideration.

We were hoping for a small one to two column write-up only. Serious. Fortunately, the coverage was better than we had expected and it turns out to be a 3/4 page feature.

We are extremely happy about the coverage. But more importantly, we hope that with this exposure, more people will read up on our stories about food wastage and from today onwards, be a little more conscious about the food you waste.

*Edit

We were told there is a little segment published on MyPaper as well. Here it is:

Our final-year project photography shoots ALWAYS require us to travel to ulu (remote) parts of Singapore. In terms of the most ulu part of Singapore, you don’t have to look further than Semakau Landfill, an island several kilometers away from the Harbourfront area and that’s very far away by Singapore standards.

This photograph was  meant for The Food Waste Recycling Dilemma story, which talks about how organic waste along with general waste are incinerated and disposed at Semakau Landfill using bulldozers and trucks. Eventually the photo made its way into my photo essay on the Carbon Food Print.

Sounds easy? Not until you have to be at Pasir Panjang Ferry Terminal at eight in the morning to travel there via a small boat, only to spend the entire day there and ONLY to encounter rain… but i digress. The shot actually required some luck. In the words of Henri Cartier Bresson, it was a moment the subjects, composition and lighting happen at the right time at the right place to make the shot possible.

I started off by positioning myself over at the other side of the landfill to photograph the bulldozers in action.

edit: I spotted a splendid photo opp at this location too but that’s another story for another day.

After a few shots here, i decided that i was not close enough and preferred to photograph a close-up of the bulldozer (my longest focal length was 50mm that day zzz). Thanks to the nice officer in charge of taking us around that day, we drove up onto the landfill in a bad to get closer.

A bulldozer and the operator was waiting for trucks to transport ash over

Even so, it just was not close enough by my standards.

It was time to get even closer.

So i decided to whip out my 24mm and got really really close.

Ok, that's close enough for me.

Ok, so this distance was perfect for me. But something was missing in terms of composition.

So i went down on one knee (i regretted it the moment i got down) to shoot from a bottom-up angle. Just then, the trucks transporting the incinerated ash were making its way to this side of the island.

In photography language, this one particular truck ‘entered my frame’. It was just the element that i needed to give some depth to the photo and that was how i nailed the shoot.

The late war photographer Robert Capa once said that if your photo is not good enough, then you are not close enough. Hope this experience of mine can lend you some inspiration when photographing next time.

Oh by the way, here’s the result of spending too much time on the landfill:

A UK author, our first source of inspiration, who published the book Waste: Uncovering The Global Food Scandal shortly after we decided on food wastage. Visit this to learn about the food wastage situation in the UK.

2. Jonathan Bloom

A resource site on food wastage in the US by American journalist and researcher Jonathan Bloom.

3. Love Food Hate Waste

A fun UK-based website that teaches you ways to recycle your leftover food.

4. Bernard Han

Statistics on food waste and recycling rates in Singapore, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, as well as calculations on incineration fees.

5. Food For All

A local research and action group founded by undergraduate Heather Chi. It aims to support local food rations programmes, raise awareness of hunger and food issues and encourage the appreciation, and respect for, good food and those who prepare and grow it.

6. Food For All wikispaces

A open and interactive portal for the public to share and discuss food-related news, research and initiatives relevant to Singapore.

7. Eugene Tay

The 2008 waste situation in Singapore and methods to reduce food waste.

8. Food Crisis and the Global Land Grab

This blog contains mainly news reports about the global rush to buy up or lease farmlands abroad as a strategy to secure basic food supplies or simply to make money. A resource for those monitoring or researching the issue of food security.

9. The Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA)

The international alliance works against incinerators and for safe, sustainable and just alternatives. Challenges Singapore’s waste management system.

10. Freeganism

Learn about freegans (aka scavengers) in New York city who subsist on leftover food.

11. CHOOSE by Olive Ventures

Shop for eco products from accessories to electronics, which are also available at 26A Sago Street.

This post was submitted by Yusuf Bah.

TRY to imagine 10,000 SBS (Singapore Bus Services) double-decker buses lining the Pan-Island Expressway three times over, and you’ll come close to picturing the volume of food Singapore throws out every year.

That is around 570 million kilos of food, most of which are edible scraps.

For a tiny island that buys more than 95 per cent of its food from overseas, how are we capable of squandering one-fifth* of it?

While Singaporeans are keen to call the city-state a food paradise, mouths immediately clamp up when asked about food wastage.

Supermarkets that display an abundance of food on their shelves refuse to talk about leftover stock. Five-star hotels that boast gourmet cuisines decline to comment on wastage in banquets. Even buffet service staff shrug and claim to know nothing about food wastage.

To get under the blanket of food waste secrecy, we spoke to over 200 people from all walks of life, snooped through food retailers’ garbage in the wee hours, spied on buffet operations, took up part-time waitressing jobs in five-star hotels and analysed food waste collected from 150 families.

Clearly, food waste goes beyond the plate. From the picky shopper who insists on perfect-looking fruits to substandard food prepared by the ignorant worker, there is more to understand how food wastage comes about in our everyday lives.

Food paradise or food waste republic? You decide.

Press and pinch: Fresh produce are most susceptible to damage from shoppers’ handpicking.

A WELL-COIFED, savvy shopper with a mission, Sandy Teo picks up a roll of lettuce and turns it around to check for tints of yellow. Once she spots the slightest sign, it gets tossed back to the rack like a basketball.

The process continues until she finds her ideal lettuce – perfectly green, flawless, free of worm bites. Back home, the 35-year-old peels off the first two layers as they are deemed unclean to eat.

Unknown to her, the first two layers were once the fifth and sixth layers of the lettuce two days ago. From farm to fork, food goes through progressive rounds of cosmetic filtering, where it gets discarded for looking less than perfect according to market standards.

Before Madam Teo’s supreme roll of lettuce hit the rack, it went past the sharp eyes and skilful hands of vegetable sellers at Pasir Panjang wholesale market, where the first phase of cosmetic filtering takes place.

Every day, 250 vegetable sellers at the market spend dusk to dawn trimming, preening and discarding “ugly” vegetables to prepare them for sale to hawkers and wet market sellers.

The criteria: vegetables must be free of pest marks, be in the right shade of colour and not look too ripe.

“Of course I’ve to make my vegetables look nice. If not, who will buy them?” says stall owner Albert Li, 60.

He estimates about one-third of all vegetables at the wholesale market get thrown away for not meeting the mark.

Green galore: A Pasir Panjang wholesale seller filters out the perfect-looking vegetables to prepare them for sale.

Based on our observations at food waste recycling company IUT Global, the market discards up to 30,000 kilos of unwanted vegetable parts and blemished fruits every day.

American journalist Jonathan Bloom, 33, who chronicles food waste and efforts to salvage it, attributes this quest for cosmetic perfection to the increasing popularity of food culture.

“More people are watching cooking shows on television. The food magazines always have not just perfect but beautiful items. Now, stores make more effort to turn their displays into an exhibit,” he says in an email interview.

“A little bit of that trend is fine, but we’ve gone too far when we’re not harvesting pears that aren’t the right circumference.”

Avoidable or unavoidable waste? During food preparation, rank-and-file workers may waste food unwittingly without the management’s knowing.

AT 9PM on a Sunday, a Chinese economic rice stall displays an array of 20 food trays barely emptied of its contents – a telltale sign of bad business.

After serving the last customer of the day, the Malaysian workers prepare to clear up. In a clockwork motion, the dishes are brought into the kitchen, two trays at a time, and stealthily poured into a black trash bag placed beside the kitchen door.

In 10 minutes, a worker seals the fate of the curry chicken, steamed egg, stir-fried long beans and other dishes in the bag. That made up around 30 per cent of the food prepared.

“You’ll see the same scale of food waste everywhere,” says cook Kam Wong Jin, 32, who has been working in Singapore for eight years.

Seeing edibles dumped every day, Mr Kam, however, does not entertain the idea of cooking less food. “There will be no business if there’s not enough food. Besides, my boss will scold,” he says.

Speaking to over 50 food retailers, none of them would admit to food wastage.

The uneaten feast: During the Hungry Ghost Festival, food offerings are usually thrown away after being placed in the open air for long hours.

ALMOST once a month in Zainah Anang’s five-room flat, her living room turns into a visual feast, literally.

Plates of rice, curry fish, vegetables, dal char, chicken biryani, murtabak, beehoon, and 10 other dishes are laid out on a long white mat for her guests of 30, mainly family members, to tuck in for the kenduri (a feast that comes after a half hour prayer session).

The 47-year-old business administrator always ensures that there is enough food to go around. “It’s a shame to the family when you let your guests go hungry,” she says.

The Asian culture of profligate hospitality is about providing an abundance of food to guests.

“When that happens, you can’t tell the capacity your guests would consume and this would lead to excess food provided,” says Edwin Khew, 61, chief executive and managing director of food waste recycling company IUT Global.

IUT Global collects more food waste, mostly from hotels and restaurants, during the festive period. This chimes with a December 2009 article by The Straits Times that reported a 30 per cent rise in food waste during festivities.

Restaurant consultant and food writer Guy Hoh, 37, attributes this to a culture where people like to see food in bounty. “I’ll bow to the side of abundance if I’m a businessman. It’s a lifestyle choice,” he says.

Food waste per million population in developed Asian countries

At social events such as Chinese wedding banquets, it is common to see hosts offering an eight or nine-course dinner, more than what their guests can usually finish.

“It’s a matter of face,” says Mr Khew. “If your guests clean up everything, it means you’re not providing enough.”

A former banquet waitress at Hilton Hotel, Toh Xin Yi, estimates that 30 per cent of the prepared food would be thrown away. During her one-year stint, the 19-year-old had noticed that most of the people were there to socialise, not eat.

What a waste: Red trash bags of discarded cooked food offerings piles up in Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery waiting to be cleared by the waste collector.

Guests who attend dinner and dance events waste even more food than banquets, says a banquet manager who has been working with a four-star hotel for over 20 years. “They will be busy watching the show, leaving the food cold and barely touched.”

Social functions aside, religious events such as the Chinese Hungry Ghost Festival sees a lot of food being dumped too.

At Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery, an average of 20 large trash bags of cooked food were thrown away daily during the Hungry Ghost Festival, says Madam Lau, a helper who has been working in the temple for 11 years. She does not wish to disclose her full name and age.

During this period, thousands of devotees offer food to their ancestors in the Chinese temples. But some are convinced that it is bad luck to consume the food offerings after prayers, so they leave the food there to be discarded.

Housewife Ng Kum Hong, 60, believes that these people are just lazy to bring the food back home. “It’s the same as eating the food offerings when we pray at home,” says the Buddhist devotee.

In an email interview, food waste researcher and American journalist Jonathan Bloom, 33, says, “It’s not my place to judge cultural practices, but I would say that it’s ‘unfortunate’ in that it creates so much waste.”