When you and your family go out for dinner, do you notice how many dishes you usually order? It’s OK if you finish all of them. But if you waste too much food, you need to pay for it.

Last year, China’s top legislature (立法机关) reviewed (审议) a draft law (法律草案) for stopping food waste for the first time. In general, a draft will become law after the top legislature reviews it three times.

According to the draft law, restaurants should tell customers not to order too much. If customers leave too much food uneaten, restaurants can charge (收费) them for food waste. The law also bans (禁止) waiters from encouraging people to order too much food. Some restaurants may use the “N-1” mode for people to order dishes. “N” stands for the number of persons at a table. So if there are six people at your table, you should order just five dishes, which can help people control the amount of dishes in a proper way.

The draft law also asks schools to teach their students to avoid food waste. It also bans TV programs about overeating and overdrinking. Producers of such programs will face a fine of up to 100,000 yuan.

Food waste happens in many places and has long been a big problem around the world. We need to obey the law and refuse to waste food.

As a recent UN (联合国) report said, the world is going through the worst food crisis (危机) in 50 years and almost 690 million people in the world are not in good health. China has worked hard to stop food waste in order to reach the UN’s goal — Zero Hunger in 2030.

Though many countries face the food crisis in the world, the number of food waste in some rich countries is surprising. The Chinese Academy of Sciences (中国科学院) did some research a few years ago. The research collected information from four cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu and Lhasa. They found that cities in China wasted 17 to 18 billion kilograms of food every year. That was the amount of food that 30 to 50 million people eat every year. The report said tourist groups, primary and middle school students, and parties were the top three reasons for food waste.

Looking at other countries with enough food, the amount of food waste is also high. In the US, food waste is between 30-40 percent of the food that people can get. In the EU, people waste around 88 billion kilograms of food every year, and it is worth about 143 billion euros (169 billion US dollars).

Food waste has increasingly become a big problem in the world. Lots of populations are still hungry for different reasons. In some places, people can’t grow crops because the weather is too hot and dry. Sometimes people can’t get enough food because of wars, a natural disaster like rainstorms or COVID-19. Though China doesn’t face a food crisis and has rich food these years, the Chinese people still need to save food.

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