[susan53]

Scraps are also often the bits you don't want to eat but can use for another purpose (as Sidewalker says, perhaps to give to the dog). For example, when I'm cooking chicken for my husband who must only eat lean meat, I cut all the fatty bits off before I cook it and put them out for my two tame crows who visit the balcony every day. The same with the skin of poultry and fish. I'd call those scraps. I also use vegetable scraps to make compost for my plants - I cut up bits of potato peel, banana skins, apple cores etc etc to compost. The important thing is that, as the name suggests, they're small pieces.

An important use for surplus food these days is to donate it to organisations which provide meals for the poor or homeless. Here in Italy there are organisations which will collect food that has not been used but is still edible from supermarkets, restaurants etc and distribute it to charitable organisations for this purpose. Supermarkets might donate food that has almost, but not quite, reached its sell-by date. Restaurants might donate cooked food, bread etc which they'd prepared expecting customers who didn't come.