The Editor
How can a country whose citizens complain of hunger afford to throw away food? Visit our markets, inspect supermarket waste, and look inside rubbish bins, and the contradiction becomes difficult to ignore.
According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the world wasted 1.05 billion tonnes of food in 2022, equivalent to 19 per cent of food available to consumers. That is a staggering global indictment of inefficiency. 
In Zambia, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) reported in December 2025 that post-harvest losses can reach 30–40 per cent, largely because of inadequate storage, poor handling, and limited transport. These are estimates of losses across the post-harvest system, not a verified national tonnage of food discarded.
The lesson is clear: producing more food is not enough if we cannot preserve, process, distribute, and sell it efficiently.
President Hakainde Hichilema’s Grow Zambia Agenda offers an opportunity to turn this challenge into economic progress. Investment in storage facilities, cold chains, food processing, and reliable markets can protect farmers’ incomes, create jobs for young people, and make better use of the food Zambia already produces.
Supermarkets, restaurants, marketeers, and households also have a role to play. Safe, edible surplus food should be redirected where practical, while spoiled food must be handled responsibly. The government must support these efforts with reliable data, effective infrastructure, and measurable targets for reducing food losses.
As the world commemorates World Food Day, Zambia must confront an uncomfortable truth: hunger is not only about how much food we grow, but also about how much we lose and who can afford what remains.
Grow Zambia must mean growing more, wasting less, and creating value from every harvest.
