http://trueslant.com/daviddisalvo/2009/11/27/study...
Here’s a new research finding to chew on over the holidays: food waste per person in the United States has increased 50 percent since 1974. That’s 1400 calories of equivalent food waste every day, which adds up to 150 trillion calories a year.
The study, authored by researchers from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, was recently published in the open access journal PLoS ONE. Researchers conducted a calculation of the difference between the U.S. food supply and what’s actually eaten, which was estimated by using a model of human metabolism and known body weights. According to the study, about 40 percent of all the food produced in the U.S. is thrown out.