To those talking about expiry dates: No one's talking about removing expiry dates. The expiry date is only required on a few categories of food and it communicates when that food will expire.
This article and the government's current consideration is whether to remove best before dates which are a completely separate thing. Best Before dates only communicate when the product is at its best.
Expiry Date: Don't consume after this date. No one's talking about changing it.
Best Before Date: It's still totally okay to consume it just might not be perfect. People are talking about removing them because with food prices getting out of control, poverty increasing, and people struggling to even survive, the government is concerned hungry people are throwing away good food.
And instead of addressing the out of control economy, or ensuring "best before" dates accurately communicate what the heck they mean to ensure people don't throw out good food, or any other solution to the problem... they're talking about getting rid of them altogether.
I will miss 'best before' dates if they finally disappear.
Because I do dumpster diving at Shoppers 4-5 times a month
And on average month the finds add up to at least $200-300 worth of things like:
-Eggs with one in dozen broken.
-Bacon being tossed for being in a 500g pack.
-Milk with one of the three bags leaking.
-Almond milk short dated.
-OJ past BB date, that tastes fine for us three weeks after said date.
- Crackers and chocolate that still taste just fine past BB dates.
-Muffins with one a bit moldy, but other 5 good if fridge stored and eaten soon.
-Tons of returns on all sorts of things that basically have nothing wrong with them
-Lots of cleaning products that are slow leakers, that we bring home and repour into an old empty containers we have kept around for these sort of situations.
www.safefood.net
