The “International Workshop on Food Loss and Waste Prevention targeting Southeast and East Asia region”, organized by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) of Japan as the presidency holder of 2019 MACS-G20, FAO Japan, UN Environment Programme and Thünen Institute, was held from October 16 to 18, 2019 at the United Nations University in Tokyo, Japan. As the current MACS-G20 chair, JIRCAS President Dr. Masa Iwanaga participated and gave the welcome address.

The workshop on food loss and waste aims to promote cooperation and networking to reduce food waste by half at retail and consumer level, and reducing food loss across the supply chain among countries in the Southeast and East Asia region. Pres. Iwanaga mentioned the tremendous economic and environmental impacts of food loss and waste on global food security and sustainable development, and described JIRCAS efforts in developing technologies that could contribute in addressing issues.

In the keynote speech, Ms. Toshiko Takeya, a member of the House of Councilors, National Diet of Japan, explained the process of enacting laws on food loss reduction in Japan and examples of efforts to reduce food loss, and emphasized the need to accelerate efforts to further reduce food loss and waste in the future.