I needed a can of green beans while I was cooking, so I asked my neighbor if he had any, and he sent me this, saying that it was all he had…

To put this into perspective: according to the USDA’s 2014 study, an estimated 133 billion pounds and $161 billion worth of food were wasted in 2010.

If saving money isn’t enough of an incentive to educate yourself about the meaning of dates on food labels, consider the environment. Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme, states that food waste is a “major contributor to the three planetary crises of climate change: nature and biodiversity loss, pollution, and waste,” according to the UNEP Food Waste Index Report 2021.