Only one in three businesses in New Zealand have their food waste under control, according to new research, which has drawn a connection between this issue and productivity.

More than 3000 medium and large businesses in the country’s food sector were surveyed by Kai Commitment. According to the study, nearly 60 per cent of respondents say that they needed to do more work on food waste, with only half saying they track the causes and financial impact of such waste.

The findings, Kai Commitment said, show that most food waste in New Zealand businesses is preventable, with the leading drivers including product quality and specification issues, supply chain constraints, forecasting challenges, and human error.

“Food waste is often framed as a sustainability issue, but what this research highlights is that it is fundamentally a business performance issue,” Kai Commitment’s interim executive director, Carmen Doran, said.

“It impacts margins, operational efficiency, and increasingly how businesses meet reporting and customer expectations. The opportunity is real, and many businesses are already seeing the benefits when they start to measure and manage it properly.”

Global supply chain and operations expert Ian Walsh, MD of Argon & Co, said the findings reflect a wider productivity challenge facing New Zealand businesses.

“New Zealand has been falling behind other OECD countries in productivity growth, and one of the reasons is that we are not consistently adopting proven best practices in how we run our operations,” Walsh added.

“Food waste is one form of operational waste. If you produce more than you need, move product inefficiently, or add unnecessary processing, you create cost and inefficiency. Addressing food waste is part of building a more productive, competitive business.”