Believing that the healthy lasts less is changing how we eat (and how much we waste)

Today, knowing how much a food really lasts has become almost a mystery. How much does a pepper in the fridge endure? Why does that apple have been in the fruitman for a week and nobody eats it? Have you spoiled or simply believe it? This confusion could be causing something else, an unnecessary increase in food waste.

Short. Many foods come with labels such as “consuming preferably before”, “expiration date”, or even “packaged the …”, which has always been interpreted as a deadline for food security. However, According to EFSA (European Food Security Agency), this type of labeling does not mean that food is not safe after that date, but could lose quality, not security.

There is a study behind. Between 2018 and 2024, more than 3,500 consumers from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and South Korea participated in an academic study in eight parts, Published in the Journal of Marketing Research. The objective of research was to understand how the perception of “healthy foods” affects their management and consumption.

In one of the experiments, scientists asked participants to classify six products (cereals, snack bars, protein bars, yogurt, cookies and fried potatoes) in two categories: those who considered healthier and those who believed they would expire faster. The majority assumed that the food considered “healthier” were the ones who thought they would spoil before. Jeehye Christine Kim, professor at the University of Virginia and co -author of the study, explained it as follows: “This is due to the lack of knowledge about the deterioration of food. Consumers apply what they know about fresh fruits and vegetables to packaged foods, even when it is not logical to do it.”

But there is something else. Research has shown that consumers were more likely to throw healthy food as their expiration date approached than to discard less healthy products in the same situation.

However, researchers have given him a name: Heuristic Health. An automatic assumption that leads to think that, if a food is healthy, it must also be more perishable. That belief is born from the real experience with fresh fruits and vegetables – which are spoiled quickly – and is erroneously applied to packaged products such as yogurts or bars. To that is added another factor: the fear of making mistakes. As we do not always know how to identify whether a food is still safe or not, and since the labels do not help, we prefer to discard it “just in case.” But that “just in case” has a cost: more wasted food, many times without need.

A search to waste less. Researchers suggest that one of the keys to solve this problem is on labeling. As explained by Brent McFerran, professor at Simon Fraser University and Co -author of the study, to The Wall Street Journalboth the food industry and governments must act, since “many perfectly healthy and safe foods for consumption usually throw themselves in the trash due to ignorance of how long they can be consumed without danger.”

For its part, EFSA promotes information campaigns so that consumers learn the difference between expiration labels and preferred consumption, and drives manufacturers to improve the clarity of their containers.

Beyond choosing healthy. Eating healthy should not mean throwing more food. But while confusion persists on what a date printed in a container really means, thousands of perfectly edible products will continue to end in the trash every day.

Understanding what the labels mean, demanding clarity and rethinking our perceptions can have a real impact, not only on our health, but also on the planet. Because choosing healthy should also include taking care of what is not wasted.

Image | Dean Hochman

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