While food waste is hardly a new phenomenon, the private and public sectors alike have only recently emphasized food waste as a critical material to manage for both waste diversion and greenhouse gas reduction.

In 2015, the US EPA underscored this important reality by releasing the first national food waste reduction goal to halve the quantity of food waste by 2030.

As the largest portion of the US municipal solid waste stream, a 50% decrease of food waste sent to landfill would significantly reduce methane emissions, a greenhouse gas exponentially more potent than carbon dioxide.

The 2016 "ReFed Roadmap to Reduce US Food Waste by 20 Percent  determined that of 27 solutions explored in depth, centralized composting was the most effective in terms of overall waste diverted, jobs created, and emissions reduced.

For this reason, it's vital to foster the growth of organics diversion.

Though composting infrastructure in the US is nascent, numerous cities and states are making significant headway in increasing collection of compostables in curbside and drop-off capacities...

The Value of Compostable Packaging Report explores how compostable packaging may enable increased food scrap diversion, building feedstock for compost manufacturers.

To illuminate this opportunity, the Report uses five waste characterizations to analyze the quantities of both food and compostable packaging in front-of-house and back-of-house settings at each venue.

By understanding the amount of food waste that compostable packaging can bring to a compostables bin in different settings, compost manufacturers and venues can make informed decisions that ultimately divert waste and reduce emissions.