Reducing food waste by nudging - The Matvett Challenge
Is it possible to change food waste habits in eight weeks? Together with nudgelab, Matvett have conducted a nudging experiment with 230 participants from Norwegian households, deciding on three different food categories they wanted to stop wasting and having a plan for how to achieve this. The results showed that six out of ten managed this almost everyday and that three out of four also managed to throw away less of other food categories. The results and further recommendations for upscaling can be found in the report available at the end of this article.
We have set a goal to halve food waste in Norway by 2030. Much of this reduction needs to be made in households, which are responsible for over 40 % of identified food waste, throwing away over 192,100 tonnes of edible food every year. This is equivalent to about 35 kg per person. Previous initiatives directed at households have generally taken the form of campaigns to convey information and change attitudes. Allthough food waste have been reduced in Norwegian households over the last two years, the work needs to be scaled up to reach the overall aim.
Nudging recommended by The Norwegian Food Waste Committee
In their report, the Food Waste Committee that was put down by the Norwegian Government in 2023, identified nudging as one of the ecommended initiatives. For this reason, Matvett (the food and hospitality industry’s organisation for preventing food waste in Norway) hired nudgelab to test how using behavioural science and nudging could make it easier for households to throw away less food and contribute to a long-term reduction in food waste in households.
Promising results
The goal for this experiment was to test interventions in a small sample (a nudge group and a control group) of households that represent a broadly composed target group from all over Norway. The objective was to learn whether it is possible to get people to actually change their behaviour so that they become aware of what they are throwing away, and over a period of eight weeks manage to reduce their food waste.
The results showed that:
- 6 out of 10 households did not waste their chosen food categories
- 3 out of 4 wasted less of other food categories
- Reduced likelihood of throwing away food
- Increased use of strategies to not throw away food
- Increased self-efficacy and use of plans
- Higher level of awareness of own food waste
- Positive change in attitudes
- Increased awareness around barriers that make it difficult to reduce food waste
″Many of the changes were significant, and where there were differences between the groups, the biggest change was in the nudge group, which indicates that the nudge initiatives had the desired effect. Experiences from the project will be used to find ways to help and inspire the entire population to throw away less food.″Irmelin Bergh, PhD and partner in nudgelab
Recommandations for further upscaling
To achieve significant and long-term reduction in food waste among Norwegian households, a number of measures and strategies are recommended.
″The results from the Matvett Challenge show that nudging is an effective method of creating increased awareness of your own food waste and achieving actual behavioural change.″Anne Marie Schrøder, head of Communication in Matvett
It is gratifying that even those who participated in the control group changed their habits and reduced their food waste. This means that it is fully possible to achieve good results in households by utilising the various strategies used in the Matvett Challenge. We have prepared some recommendations for how this can be taken further and hopefully result in a national strategy with associated intervention programs and platforms with concrete tools. You can read more about these recommendations in the report below, but in brief summary they are as follows:
- Establishing of a national intervention programme
- Collaborating with the local government sector
- Using existing digital platforms
- Using specific short-term goals
- Implementing awareness campaign(s)