Marks & Spencer is the first business to roll out the redistribution service Neighbourly Food on a national scale to donate food that would otherwise be wasted to local community organisations.

Neighbourly Food has been set up by Neighbourly.com, which is a social platform that aims to connect business with community projects. Charities, food banks and recycling organisations can sign up to the new service to tell retailers what their food needs are.

Retailers can also use the platform to list their surplus food, where it is and when it expires.

Neighbourly.com launched in July 2014 and added food redistribution in August 2015.

Mike Barry, director of sustainable business at Marks & Spencer, said: “We tested the service thoroughly before committing to a national rollout. During a pilot covering just six stores, we were able to redistribute four tonnes of surplus food in three months.  Now we aim to have 150 stores participating by December and network-wide adoption by early next year.”

Earlier this year Tesco partnered with FareShare to launch a mobile phone app that enables retailers to alert community organisations to available surplus food stocks.

Retailers are under pressure to reduce food waste, with the government having set a target to halve it by 2025.