The problem of food waste was studied in order to improve our school curriculum. We reviewed all the material relating to food waste in the textbooks used for teaching the compulsory curriculum in Japan, and introduced the programmes developed by Waste Watch, a British organization for food waste education, and the environmental education system by the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVDR). We found that the descriptions of food waste in the Japanese textbooks were not sufficient for children to acquire a thorough knowledge of the subject.The curriculum for domestic science teaching needs to be improved and extended.