Likbez: what actually means expiration dates on food
'16.04.2022'
Source: CNN
No one wants to feed their family with spoiled food, but on the other hand, they don't want to throw away food that is fit for consumption.
According to the US Department of Agriculture, Americans annually throw away safe food for the sum of 162 billion dollars, writes CNN.
Some of these losses are accounted for by buyers who confuse “use by” and “best before” on food packaging. Most buyers check the expiration date of a product before purchasing, and many of them do not know the real meaning of the date phrases.
“Sell by,” “best if used by,” “use by” - they all mean different things. Contrary to popular belief, the current expiration date on food products is not intended to help consumers understand when a particular food goes from edible to inedible.
At the moment, food companies are not obliged to use a single formulation when specifying the shelf life of a product, which allows them to indicate dates that, in fact, are not the term of product suitability for consumption.
On the subject: 9 amazing end-of-life products
Consumer confusion
According to studies, about 20% of products are thrown away still usable due to a misunderstanding of the dates indicated on the packaging. The average family in the United States spends about 275-455 dollars per year for disposing of unused food.
Due to a mistaken concern for food safety, 91% of consumers throw away food after the date indicated with the phrase “sell by,” which has nothing to do with the safety of the product at all and is a recommendation for the store.
37% of consumers throw away a product after the date indicated with the phrase “use by”, which actually defines the period of the “highest quality” of the product, as the manufacturers explain. In fact, the only information that can be obtained from the date shown on the packaging concerns how long a particular item has been on the shelf in the store.
How to find out when the product went bad
Manufacturers can add a variety of ingredients or preservatives to their products to prolong their shelf life. But no matter what the manufacturer uses, no product can be stored forever. Each manufacturing company conducts research of its product to determine when it goes beyond the “inedibility” and can harm the body of the consumer.
In most cases, manufacturers use the phrase “use by” to identify such a date, which means that from that moment on, the use of the product may be unsafe. Moreover, in most cases, companies indicate the date a few days earlier before the moment of real inedibility of the product. But there is no standard for the duration of this "safety factor", so it can be either one day or a week.
Some companies to determine this date do not use the research data of their product, but the existing “calculator” of the shelf life of each product, given its composition. Therefore, the dates indicated on such goods may be very approximate and do not mean at all that after their onset the product has become unsafe.
On the subject: How to behave in a supermarket, so as not to throw money away
Even the most well-calculated dates are just a guide
Food safety is in the hands of the consumer. They must store it at an appropriate temperature and in a hygienic environment.
If the product has an expiration date on the packaging, consumers should follow this date to determine when to use or freeze it. If he does not have a date, it is worth using common sense. If the food is moldy or has an unpleasant odor, do not eat it. In this case, the best thing is to follow the advice: “If food is in doubt, throw it away.”
