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Guest of Honour: Nicola Hopley, Food Waste Team Leader, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

This conference will bring together policymakers and key stakeholders to discuss the future of UK food waste policy and the role that producers, retailers, households and government can play in reducing waste across the food chain.

Delegates will discuss the future of voluntary agreements for the sector in light of the announcement of Courtauld 2025 which seeks to further develop collaborative frameworks on waste, recommendations in the Environment Audit committee's 4th report for ending the 'throwaway society', and the role of government in food waste reduction affecting key areas of production. They will also consider latest thinking on innovation - including advances in packaging - to reduce food waste going to landfill, and latest developments regarding anaerobic digestion.

Further planned areas for discussion include the direction of European food waste policy after the review of Europe 2020 in May of next year, and the lessons that can be learnt from new schemes such as the Institute of Groceries Distribution's 'Working on Waste' campaign and the UNFAO's Global Community Practice on Food Loss Reduction.

We are delighted that Nicola Hopley, Food Waste Team Leader, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Mark Little, Head of Food Waste Reduction, Tesco; Dr Richard Swannell, Director of Sustainable Food Systems, WRAP; Dick Searle, Chief Executive, The Packaging Federation; Mark Varney, Director of Food, Fareshare and David Bellamy, Environment Policy Manager, Food and Drink Federation have agreed to deliver keynote addresses at this seminar, together with a senior speaker confirmed from the European Commission.

Caroline Drummond, Chief Executive, Linking Environment And Farming; Richard Gueterbock, Marketing Director, Clearfleau; Charlotte Morton, Chief Executive, Anaerobic Digestion and Bioresources Association; Peter Melchett, Policy Director, The Soil Association; Julian O'Neill, Chief Executive Officer, Biogen and Matt Smyth, Waste Development Group Manager, Surrey County Council have also kindly agreed to speak at this seminar.

Baroness Jenkin of Kennington and Lord Dykes have kindly agreed to chair sessions at this seminar.