Taste the Waste: dir Valentin Thurn (2011)

Valentin Thurn’s documentary shines a spotlight on the global scandal of food waste. Why do we throw away so much? On the way from the farm to the dinner table, more than half the food we grow gets thrown away. European households throw away 100 billion Euros worth of food each year – as much as the annual turnover at Nestlé, the world’s largest food corporation. The food people throw away in Europe would be enough to feed all the hungry people in the world twice over … So what can we do? How can we improve our behaviour?

Thurn seeks explanations: from supermarket sales staff and managers, from bakers, wholesale market inspectors, welfare recipients, ministers, farmers and EU bureaucrats. We all have responsibility: the EU for instance sets restrictive guidelines for selling produce (apples must have a minimum size; potatoes must not be too big or too small), and customers’ tastes and preference are equally burdensome (who is happy to buy day-old bread? Why do we expect flawless fruit?). At least Thurn finds that some people do oppose this madness with imagination and commitment.

The film screens in the NAAS programme under the umbrella title Green Reel: Films for a Sustainable Future, featuring independent films from around the world that focus on the environment and sustainability. NAAS is a collaboration between a number of cultural institutions in the UAE: the Goethe-Institut Gulf Region, the Embassies of France in the United Arab Emirates, the Embassy of Canada to the United Arab Emirates, the Italian Cultural Institute of Abu Dhabi, the Embassy of Switzerland to the United Arab Emirates and the Kingdom of Bahrain, and Alliance Française Dubai.

NAAS: Green Reel runs from 10 September to 26 November at Alliance Française Dubai. The screenings are all free and subtitled in English.

Upcoming: (click the title for the link)

12 November More than Honey dir Markus Imhoof (2012)
19 November Hadwin’s Judgement dir Sasha Snow (2015)
26 November Dans la brume | Just a Breath Away dir Daniel Roby (2018)