Assessment of environmental and economic aspects of household food waste using a new Environmental-Economic Footprint (EN-EC) index: A case study of Daegu, South Korea

While the global food demand has continued to increase, the enormous natural resources required for its production are limited, in addition to the accompanying environmental degradation. Despite all these, food waste generation continues unabated, especially at the household level, further compounding the environmental impacts, economic cost, and food security issues. In this study, granular primary data of edible household food waste using direct-weighing from 218 households in Daegu, South Korea was used to assess the environmental (carbon footprint, and water footprint) and economic (wasted cost) impacts associated with their wastage. For the first time, the Environmental-Economic (EN-EC) Footprint index is proposed as a single indicator for environmental and economic impacts to assess the hotspot food waste products among the selected 42 major food waste items. This study presents that the selected food products had a significant contribution to an average edible food waste generation of 0.73 ± 0.06 kg (per household/day), 0.71 ± 0.05 kg CO₂eq of GHG emissions, 0.46 ± 0.04 m³ of water footprint, and 3855.93 ± 527.27 won of economic loss, respectively. Based on the newly developed EN-EC Footprint index, we found that wasted animal-based food products had relatively high environmental and economic losses compared to non-animal-based food products. The findings of this study presented a novel method of estimating combined environmental and economic impacts associated with household food waste, which may further act as convenient guides for the waste management authorities and policymakers in addressing the mitigation of household food waste impacts.