Pumpkin Waste Is Scary October 1, 2022 Email Every year, over 1 billion pounds of pumpkins are thrown away in the U.S. — over half of the total pumpkins produced. According to the USDA, over 66,000 acres in the U.S. were used to grow pumpkins in 2020. That’s about 50,000 football fields of land growing pumpkins that we could use to grow food we actually want to eat instead.