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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sustain. Food Syst.
Sec. Agricultural and Food Economics
Volume 9 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fsufs.2025.1502264
This article is part of the Research Topic Food Waste Reduction During Consumption and Disposal View all 5 articles
The association between refrigerator use and carbon footprint of household food waste: empirical evidence from China
Provisionally accepted- 1 Nanjing University of Finance and Economics, Nanjing, China
- 2 Jiangsu Open University, Nanjing, Liaoning Province, China
Food waste in household settings contributes 66% of the global carbon footprint of food waste. Based on the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) and the China Food Life Cycle Assessment Database (CFLCAD), this paper explores the resource and environmental impacts of food waste from the perspective of the use of refrigeration equipment as a refrigerator in Chinese households, and based on life cycle theory. The primary findings are that (1) Refrigerator use significantly reduces the carbon footprint of household food waste. (2) Dietary knowledge plays a moderating role in the food waste carbon footprint effect of refrigerator use. (3) Heterogeneity analyses show that the effect of refrigerator use on household food waste carbon footprint varies according to the gender and education level of the household head, household per capita income level and urban-rural type. This paper provides evidence that the popularization of refrigerators reduces the carbon footprint of household food waste in China, which may have implications for other countries.
Keywords: Food waste, Refrigerator use, Carbon Footprint, China, household
Received: 26 Sep 2024; Accepted: 11 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhang, Ye, Qian, Han, Zuo and Li. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Li Zhang, Nanjing University of Finance and Economics, Nanjing, China
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