Author Jonathan Bloom talks (edible) trash in Raleigh

Food-waste expert, writer, and Durham resident Jonathan Bloom has three Triangle readings coming up, based on his just-published book “American Wasteland: How America Throws Away Nearly Half of Its Food (and What We Can Do About It).”

Food waste is finally starting to get the attention it deserves, and some of that credit goes to Jonathan, who has been blogging about the issue for years at wastedfood.com. We Americans waste between a quarter and a half of the 590 billion pounds of food grown here (that doesn’t count imports), a number that has grown by 50 percent since the 1970s. Leading culprits are consumers, farms, supermarkets, the food-service industry, and government.