By Andrew Brown in Canberra

Rising prices at checkouts have forced a growing number of Australians to resort to dumpster diving, an inquiry has heard, while supermarkets are accused of wasting food.

A Senate probe into supermarket prices was told cost of living pressures had led to many people skipping meals altogether, or sourcing food that had been thrown out.

Amelia Cromb from the organisation Grassroots Action Network Tasmania said large amounts of food at supermarkets had been needlessly thrown away before the expiry of ‘best before dates’.

“It just seems like such a cruel mockery almost that people are going to supermarkets to buy food that is a human right … and at the end of the day the supermarket can just basically rip the tag off that high price, throw it in the bin as though it had no value at all,” she said.

“It’s criminal, there’s no other way to put it, it’s just unacceptable.”

Ms Cromb told the committee that significant portions of food that were thrown out of supermarkets were still consumable, which the community group had regularly passed on to people in need.

“These items are all in date, any logical person would see this and know that it’s consumable, the best before date is in 2025,” she said.

The inquiry heard that supermarkets should examine their processes for what food should be thrown out.

“On a systemic level, there is such rigid food or regulations and standards around food distribution,” Ms Cromb said.

“Best before labelling is often very arbitrary, often it relates more to food quality than safety alone, and I just think these in whatever way possible need to change because that is a reason why we’re seeing so much fruit be discarded.”