Have you ever been in a hurry and after rushing through the supermarket and getting home, you realize the expiration date on what you just bought for dinner passed 3 months ago? At almost any given store now, you can find expired food or food that is long past the best before date still selling on the shelves at full price. Enough is enough, its time for the government to impose regulations that will not only protect the consumer but stop the wasting of food and even help with the hunger problem we have in this country.

The “best before” and “expiration” dates on packaging is a problem that’s been driving consumers crazy for years. Every item you pick up is a new game of “Where’s Waldo”. Location, small font size, lack of contrast with the background, or written in a long code the CIA couldn’t crack are some of the biggest problems. Sometimes the date doesn’t say if it is the best before or the expiration and on top of that, a lot of people still aren’t really sure of the difference (the best before is the date of the item’s optimum freshness, but many items are still perfectly good and safe to eat beyond this date, until they reach their expiration date).

If the government were to start phasing in regulations, everyone would benefit. Heres what I would suggest:

• Every grocery item that is required to currently have a best before or expiry date should be required to have both
• The best before and expiry date to be located on the front or main side of the item.
• The size of the font for the dates should be no less than 0.3 cm high.
• The dates should be written in black on a white background or similar contrast to make it easily readable
• The dates should all be written in the same format: MMM DD YYYY

So how would the new labeling help?

• It would make it easier for supermarkets to keep stock rotated on the shelves and harder for them to try saving money by not rotating.
• Supermarkets would also be pressured to sell items that had passed the best before date but still before the expiration dates at a reduced price, making it more affordable to those on a tight budget.
• Consumers would have an easier time finding and being more aware of the dates. This would also make it harder for supermarkets to sell expired goods.
• Those consumers that could afford it would be more likely to donate to food banks when an item in their cupboard passed the best before date but had not yet expired.
• Less food waste.

You may it unethical for people that can’t afford it, to eat food that has passed the best before date but keep in mind, the taste of food is relative to how hungry you are. The best-tasting meal I ever had was not in a restaurant but on day 3 of a survival course with no food. It consisted of 3 bites of wild game meat, burnt on an open fire, with no seasoning, that had fallen in the dirt.

Dave Lister

listerlogic.com