Food loss vs food waste: what is the difference, and why it matters for the Gulf

Food loss is food that drops out of the chain after harvest and before it reaches the shop: on the farm, on the road, in storage and at the wholesaler. Food waste is food that drops out at the shop and after it: in shops, restaurants, hotels and homes. That is the difference between food loss vs food waste, and the line sits at retail: the FAO estimates 13.3% of the world's food was lost before it in 2023, and UNEP estimates 19% was wasted after it in 2022.

Before dawn at the central market, a trader lifts a crate of tomatoes that softened in yesterday's heat. Nobody ate them and nobody scraped them off a plate. They were lost on the way. After a busy lunch, a cook covers a tray of rice that is still good and knows it will not keep for tomorrow. That is waste, in a kitchen that worked hard all day. Both of them cared about the food. What differs is where it stopped.

Checked October 2026. Below: both official definitions, where the line sits, the world and Qatar numbers, and who can cut each one.

We are Wady. We make the free Purchase System and Wady Central for kitchens in Qatar, so the last part of this guide shows where Wady helps and where it does not.

Key takeaways

• Food loss happens from harvest up to, but not including, retail; food waste happens in shops, food service and homes (FAO definitions, 2019).

• The FAO estimates that 13.3% of the world's food was lost after harvest and before the shop in 2023.

• The world wasted 1.05 billion tonnes of food in 2022, 19% of the food available to consumers: 60% in homes, 28% in food service and 12% in retail (UNEP, 2024).

• UN goal 12.3 asks the world to halve food waste per person by 2030, but only to "reduce" food loss, with no number.

Food loss ends at the shop shelf and food waste begins there: 13.3% of food was lost before it in 2023, and 19% was wasted after it in 2022.

What is food loss?

Food loss is the drop in the amount or quality of food caused by the decisions and actions of suppliers along the chain, before the food reaches a shop, a restaurant or a home.

The FAO definition

The FAO, the UN's food and agriculture agency, defines it this way: "Food loss is the decrease in the quantity or quality of food resulting from decisions and actions by food suppliers in the chain, excluding retailers, food service providers and consumers" (FAO, 2019).

The UN tracks it with the Food Loss Index, indicator 12.3.1(a).

What counts as food loss

• In: food lost after harvest on the farm, in transport, in storage, in processing and at wholesale.

• Imported food too: the UN's measurement notes for indicator 12.3.1(a) say losses in storage, transport and processing are included "also of imported quantities" (UN SDG metadata, 2025). In the Gulf, the road from the port to the warehouse sits on the loss side.

• Out: losses before harvest, and food that goes on to feed or seed.

Fresh produce reaches Doha's markets through a chain where the FAO estimates 13.3% of food was lost in 2023.

What is food waste?

Food waste is the drop in the amount or quality of food caused by the decisions and actions of shops, food service and consumers, from the shop shelf onward.

The FAO and UNEP definitions

The FAO's wording: "Food waste refers to the decrease in the quantity or quality of food resulting from decisions and actions by retailers, food service providers and consumers" (FAO, 2019). UNEP, the UN Environment Programme, tracks it with the Food Waste Index, indicator 12.3.1(b), and measures food waste as food and its inedible parts removed from the human food supply chain in three sectors (UN SDG metadata, 2024).

Where food waste happens

• Retail: shops, supermarkets and other food distribution.

• Food service: restaurants, hotels, catering kitchens, schools, hospitals and canteens.

• Households: food thrown away at home.

Restaurants, hotels and other food service made up 28% of the food wasted worldwide in 2022, according to UNEP's Food Waste Index Report 2024.

Food loss vs food waste: where exactly is the line?

The line sits at retail. Everything that drops out before the shop is loss, and everything that drops out at the shop or after it is waste.

The shop shelf is the border

The farm, the truck, the cold store, the customs yard and the wholesale market sit on the loss side. The supermarket, the restaurant kitchen, the hotel buffet and the family fridge sit on the waste side.

Who decides: the supplier or the buyer?

The definitions sort food by whose decision it was. When a farmer, a transporter or a wholesaler loses the food, that is loss. When a shop, a kitchen or a household throws it out, that is waste. The same crate of lettuce counts as loss if it spoils in the supplier's warehouse, and as waste if it spoils in a restaurant's walk-in fridge.

Peels and bones: do they count?

In the UN's measurement, both sides include the inedible parts. Loss counts the whole commodity with its non-edible parts, and waste counts food together with its inedible parts, such as "bones, rinds, and pits/stones", but not packaging (UN SDG metadata, 2024). So UNEP's kilogram figures include bones and peels. In a kitchen, the gap between an item's weight before and after cleaning has its own maths, explained in how to calculate yield percentage and trim loss.

How much food is lost and wasted in the world?

About 13.3% of the world's food is lost after harvest and before the shop, and 19% of the food available to consumers is wasted after it.

• Food loss: 13.3% in 2023, up from 13.0% in 2015 (FAO, SDG 12.3.1). The FAO says this change "falls within the expected range of model oscillations", so it is not a clear trend.

• Fruit and vegetables: the highest loss of any food group, 25.4% in 2023, up from 23.2% in 2015 (same source).

• Food waste: 1.05 billion tonnes in 2022, 19% of the food available to consumers (UNEP, Food Waste Index Report 2024).

• Per person: 132 kg a year, of which 79 kg in households (same report).

• Where the waste happens: households 60%, food service 28%, retail 12% (same report, confirmed on the FAO's awareness day page).

The two percentages do not add up to one total: loss is a share of food after harvest, waste a share of food available to consumers, measured by two agencies with two methods.

Households account for 60% of the world's food waste, and in Qatar homes waste about 93 kg of food per person a year (UNEP, 2022 data).

The global goal treats them differently

UN Sustainable Development Goal target 12.3 reads: "By 2030, halve per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses" (FAO, SDG 12.3.1). Waste has a number: half per person. Loss has a direction: reduce.

Where are food loss and waste in Qatar's food chain?

Qatar has no national figure for food loss yet. It has one for household food waste: 93 kg per person a year.

The 2018 to 2023 strategy's estimates, and our reading of them

Qatar's National Food Security Strategy 2018 to 2023 estimated waste at each stage of the chain (p.17) and calls every stage "waste". Sorted by the FAO definitions, the stages fall like this. The sorting is our reading, not the strategy's:

• Loss side, before retail: farmers about 2%, the central market about 9%, wholesalers about 9%. Customs appears as a stage with no percentage, and the strategy notes clearance can take up to 12 to 24 hours (p.16).

• Waste side, retail and after: retailers about 3%, end consumers over 10%, with hotels, restaurants and caterers grouped with end consumers.

Each figure is an estimate for its own stage, so they cannot be added into one number for Qatar.

The household figure: 93 kg per person

UNEP's Food Waste Index Report 2024 puts Qatar's household food waste at 93 kg per person a year, about 250,830 tonnes, from a 2022 study, and rates it high confidence. The full story is in how much food Qatar wastes.

A national study still running

Qatar University's Social and Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI), with the Ministry of Municipality, the FAO and UNEP, was due to measure loss and waste across the whole supply chain until September 2026 (The Peninsula, April 2026). We found no published results as of October 2026. See where it fits in Qatar's food security strategy.

What does one tomato's journey show?

It shows food going missing a little at a time, and in this story most of it goes before the kitchen.

One tomato's journey follows 100 tomatoes from the farm to the plate. It is an illustration, not measured data:

• Farm, 100 to 90: too ripe to ship. Loss.

• Road, 90 to 80: bruised in the crates. Loss.

• Supplier, 80 to 70: the truck ran warm one night. Loss.

• Kitchen, 70 to 60: ordered on a guess. Waste.

• Plate: 60 are eaten, and 40 never are.

In the language of the definitions, 30 of the 40 went before the food reached a buyer, so they are loss, and 10 went in the kitchen, so they are waste. The plate sits on the waste side too.

Why does the difference change who acts?

Each side has different hands on the food: loss sits with farmers, importers, suppliers and drivers, and waste sits with shops, kitchens and homes.

The loss side: farmers, importers, suppliers and drivers

Loss falls when produce is picked at the right time, packed so it does not bruise, kept cold on the road and in the warehouse, and moved through the port and the market with fewer hours waiting.

Food lost in transport and storage, imported food included, counts toward the FAO's food loss figure of 13.3% for 2023.

The waste side: shops, kitchens, hotels and homes

Waste falls when a kitchen measures what it throws away and why, sizes portions and buffets to real guests, and buys closer to what it uses. Start with how to track food waste in a restaurant kitchen.

The order between them touches both

The order connects the two sides. When a kitchen orders on a guess, the supplier prepares on a guess too. The surplus sits in the supplier's truck or warehouse, where it becomes loss, or in the kitchen's fridge, where it becomes waste. Checking each delivery when it arrives also puts damaged stock on the right side of the line: see how to check and record a supplier delivery.

How Wady helps with food loss and waste

Wady works on the kitchen and buyer side: ordering from suppliers, receiving, counting and recording waste. Over 100 businesses in Qatar already use Wady.

For us this is more than software. Our mission is to cut food waste in the Gulf by digitizing the order between a kitchen and the suppliers it already buys from. Our vision is a Gulf food supply chain where every order is visible, so suppliers and kitchens see demand before it arrives, order what will be used, and throw less away. Food grown for what people will eat, not for a guess. Picture a supplier packing the van at 5 a.m. from orders placed last night: less softens in the back of the truck, and less sits in the walk-in.

What it does

• Purchase System (free): all your suppliers in one app, and every order saved with its items, quantities and prices. The supplier gets the order straight away, and you both hold the same record. See the Purchase System.

• Receiving (Wady Central): receive a delivery by confirming it, not retyping it.

• Counts and waste (Wady Central): a shift's waste in one entry with your reasons, waste cost by period, reason and item, and counts on paper or on screen. See stock counts and waste.

• Recipes and production (Wady Central): recipes costed on usable yield after trim, and production planned from real orders minus stock.

What it does not do

Wady does not forecast demand; every figure is arithmetic on real records. It does not measure loss on farms, on the road or at customs, and it does not fix a cold chain. Wady Central has no POS API connection yet, so it works alongside your POS.

Who it is for

Restaurants, cafes, hotels and catering kitchens in Qatar, from one cafe to a group with a central kitchen. Wady works in Qatar only for now.

Related articles

• How much food does Qatar waste? The sourced numbers and where waste starts

• Qatar's National Food Security Strategy 2030: what it means for restaurants and food suppliers

• How to Track Food Waste in a Restaurant Kitchen

• Goods Receiving Procedure: How to Check and Record a Supplier Delivery

• How to measure food waste in a restaurant kitchen: a step-by-step waste audit

See where food goes missing in your kitchen

Message us on WhatsApp at +974 7000 7658 for a Wady Central walkthrough. The free Purchase System is at order.wady.ai, on the App Store and on Google Play. Qatar only for now.