Supermarkets are urged to bin the wasteful BOGOFs

The Buy-One-Get-One-Free offers are increasingly used by stores claiming they want to help those on a budget.

But critics, including consumer groups and MPs, say they simply tempt people to buy food they have no hope of eating before it spoils.

Gordon Brown has already called on families to cut down on the food they throw out to help tackle rising grocery bills.

BOGOF deals 'encourage shoppers to waste food'

A Cabinet Office study mapping out food policy for the 21st century published yesterday found families bin a third of all food they buy.

The Prime Minister pointed to official studies showing that households throw away food worth about £420 a year, while the figure for a family home is £610.

'If we're to get food prices down, we must do more to deal with unnecessary demand by all of us doing more to cut our food waste which is costing the average household in Britain about £8 per week,' Mr Brown said.

Food campaigners said supermarkets were encouraging this type of waste.

Kath Dalmeny, policy director of food and farming alliance Sustain, said: 'Supermarkets bombard shoppers with messages to buy more and eat more.

"Shoppers end up buying products that they did not plan to and a lot of that food goes to waste.'

LibDem environment spokesman Steve Webb said: 'Supermarkets make it harder for householders to avoid food waste.

Tesco has denied profiteering from BOGOF deals

They refuse to stock small portions, which are essential for the growing number of oneperson households, and offer too many BOGOF deals on perishable goods.'

The supermarkets insist that they are simply trying to protect shoppers from rising food bills.

However, a study claims they have raked in an extra £200million in profits from higher food prices in the past two years.

Manufacturing prices rose by £3.5billion between 2005 and 2007, according to an independent study.

However, the prices then charged shoppers rose by £3.7billion.

The research on supermarket profits was carried out by analysts OC&C with The Grocer magazine.

Editor Adam Leyland said: 'The numbers don't lie. There's been a lot of speculation that supermarkets have been profiteering from food price inflation. Here...is strong evidence that they have.'

The major stores said BOGOF deals were popular, particularly in tough economic times.

Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury's denied profiteering and pointed to recent price cuts as evidence that they are helping shoppers.

The boss of Morrisons, Marc Bolland, said: 'The improvement in (profit) margin over the past year is due to costcutting and extra sales.'

Asda said its profit margin had fallen in recent years.

Waste is rampant in Whitehall. Almost 15 tons of leftovers are thrown away by each Government department every year, figures suggest.

Only four ministries actually monitor the amount of scraps composted. Together, they generated 57.2 tons of waste.

Fifteen other Government departments fail to keep records of their food waste.

If they follow the trend, however, an estimated 285 tons is being thrown away by Whitehall every year.

The findings will embarrass the Government which has warned that British householders are throwing away too much food.

'The Government is spending our money buying food which it then throws away,' said Tory environment spokesman Peter Ainsworth.

'Looking at information from one department, the Government could be throwing away hundreds of tons of food each year.'

Friends of the Earth praised departments for composting their waste but a spokesman insisted: 'They shouldn't be buying too much food in the first place.'

The Communities and Local Government department composted 19.1 tons of food waste in 2007-08, while the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs binned 19 tons in 2006-07.

The Department of Health threw out 13.7 tons in 2007-08 from its London headquarters and the Treasury got rid of 5.4 tons in 2007.