Jan 10th, 2022
2 mins
In a bid to stop millions of pints of milk being poured down the sink, supermarket Morrisons is going to scrap ‘use by’ dates on 90% of it’s own-brand milk to encourage customers to use a sniff test to check quality.
Morrisons is the first supermarkets to make this move, which starts later this month.
Milk is the third most wasted food and drink product in the UK, after potatoes and bread, with around 490 million pints wasted every year, according to Wrap.
It is estimated that 85 million pints of milk waste could be due to consumers following ‘use by’ labels, even though there is research indicating it can be used days after the date.
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) said it was alright to have ‘use by’ or ‘best before’ on milk depending on the processing and type. But there must be clear labelling, and the dates printed on all food and drink must be based on “robust evidence about the product concerned”.
The FSA also pointed out that when dealing with food generally, sniffing is not an appropriate safety test, especially with products that could cause food poisoning.
