Restaurants take on responsibility

反食品浪费法草案提交审议

When you and your family go out for dinner, have you noticed how many dishes you usually order and how much food is left? In the future, you could be fined for leaving food behind.

当你和家人外出吃饭时，你是否曾注意过，你们通常会点几道菜，又会剩多少菜呢？将来，你或许会因剩饭剩菜而被罚款。

A draft law on preventing food waste to ensure food security was submitted for its first reading to the session of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), held from Dec 22 to 26.

在12月22日至26日召开的全国人大常委会会议上，为维护粮食安全的反食品浪费法草案首次提请审议。

The draft law says that restaurants should remind customers not to order too much. The size of each dish should be explained clearly and a smaller portion should be available. If customers leave too much food, restaurants are allowed to charge for food waste.

草案规定，餐馆应提醒消费者不要超量点餐，每份餐食应清楚标明分量，且应提供小份餐的选择。如果消费者剩菜过多，餐馆可以收取处理厨余垃圾的相应费用。

Besides, catering service providers may face a fine if they encourage or mislead consumers into ordering too much food which causes waste.

此外，如果餐饮服务提供者鼓励或诱导消费者超量点餐，造成浪费，可能会面临罚款。

Food waste has been a problem across the world. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, about one-third of the world's food – 1.3 billion tons – is wasted every year. In China alone, 35 million tons of food ends up in landfills every year, with about 12 percent of the nation's harvests going to waste along the entire production chain, CCTV News reported.

食物浪费已成全球性问题。联合国粮食及农业组织数据显示，全球每年约三分之一（约13亿吨）的食物被浪费。据央视新闻报道，仅在中国，每年就有3500万吨粮食最终被送往垃圾填埋场，全国粮食产量的12%会在整个生产链中被浪费掉。

The draft law is a crucial move toward fostering a frugal attitude toward food. It is expected to provide a long-term legal system of better rules on daily catering and food consumption, according to China Daily.

这部草案是倡导节约粮食风尚的重要一步。《中国日报》报道称，该草案有望提供一个长期的法律体系，能够更好地规范日常餐饮和食物消费。

In fact, many measures have been taken against food waste already. For example, the "Clear Your Plate" campaign has been launched online and offline. Many users share photos or videos of empty plates after finishing their meals on social media platforms such as Sina Weibo.

实际上，人们已经采取了很多措施来制止食品浪费。比如，线上线下都启动了“光盘行动”。很多用户吃完饭后，会在新浪微博等社交媒体平台分享“光盘”的照片或视频。

In the canteen at Jiangxi University of Science and Technology, free fruit is given to students who finish their meals. Sun Zhenyao, 15, from Hefei No 1 High School, Anhui province, received cash incentives from one local restaurant. "We can get 5 yuan for each empty plate. It's fun and useful," he said.

在江西理工大学的食堂，“光盘”的同学可以领到免费水果。来自安徽省合肥市第一中学的15岁学生孙振耀还在当地一家餐馆获得了现金奖励。“我们吃光一盘菜就能奖励5元，这很有意思，又有意义，”他说。