Hugh's War on Waste

I've just been moved to write my first ever complaint to the BBC:

"I am writing to complain because I think Hugh’s War on Waste is very misleading, and not addressing the issue.

I gather that 25% of the food produced is going to waste, which I agree is a scandal, but I object to the idea that we can solve this by persuading the supermarkets to buy food that nobody wants, and the consumers to make smoothies and soups from the surplus. If the level of waste is as reported, then that amounts to something like 700 calories per person per day, which if consumed would lead to every man woman and child in the country gaining weight at the rate of five stones a year. Clearly the premise for the program is downright absurd, especially in a society that already has an obesity problem.

If the surplus food can’t be eaten, that leaves only two other possibilities: either throw it away, or don’t produce the surplus in the first place. Morrisons and the mis-shapes are beside the point, when the farmer complained about his predicament what he was really doing is asking another farmer to voluntarily close his business instead.

It’s good fun and popular to paint the supermarkets as villains of the piece, but this campaign is just intellectually lazy rabble-rousing."