Food waste is a weighty problem in the UAE, with 38% of food prepared wasted at a cost of 6 billion AED. To tackle the problem, ne’ma, the National Food Loss and Waste Initiative, is driving efforts to reduce food waste by 50% by 2030. To dig up the root causes of food waste, ne’ma conducted the UAE’s first National Household Survey of over 6,000 adults. These findings explore who wastes, what is wasted, and why to design the ideal policy recipe for this ambitious target.