Alderman João Gonçalves Pereira, who leads the commission, said that between May last year and May this year “2,134,704 meals were recovered by the 94 partner entities in the fight against food waste, who work in 24 civil parishes in Lisbon”.

In 2015, welfare association ‘Comunidade Vida e Paz (CVP)’, one of the partners, saved €768,000 in the meals it distributed, according to a social impact system that it has been implementing for the past two years, the association’s director, Henrique Joaquim, told Lusa News Agency.

The CVP supports 60 households with food, about 250 people, some every week, “but always on a short-term basis”, because the association’s objective is “to get people off the streets and create conditions for them to return to living autonomously”.

Portugal wastes about a million tons of food a year.