I recently had the opportunity to help lead a Penn course on sustainability and the food-water-energy nexus, with an emphasis on food waste. The bulk of the course consisted of a week-long trip to Italy. Why Italy? First, why ever not? Second, course instructor Steve Finn wanted to explore food waste through the lens of [...]
The Harvard Food Policy and Law Clinic (FLPC) just released a fabulous short film on date labels called EXPIRED? You can watch it below and don’t miss their stout op-ed in the LA Times. I’m pretty sure you won’t spend a better 5 minutes online today. EXPIRED? is part of a neat companion site with plenty of [...]
Today, the USDA and EPA joined forces with charitable organizations, faith-based organizations, food companies and local governments to set the first ever national food waste reduction goal. For sure, it’s a happy day in the land of wasted food. Yet my initial elation is now tempered with a few reservations. The Great: It’s a whopper! [...]
This Fall, I participated in an amazing Feeding the 5,000 event at UNC Chapel Hill. The organizers, Carolina Dining Services, spent weeks, if not months, preparing for this meaningful day of action. The organizers, led by Ryan Moore, gleaned sweet potatoes, sought out wonky produce, and bought bycatch fish that would otherwise have been squandered. [...]
Here’s a roundup of recent wasted food news, from the sublime to the ridiculous. With the former, a UK org called Hubbub is pushing the humble (and potentially artistic) pancake as a way to reduce wasted food. Why pancakes? Because they’re so flippin‘ versatile! On the latter, the notion of ‘raccoon meat’ certainly feels disgusting at [...]
I’ve often posted pictures of fruits and vegetables shaped like letters on this blog. You know, alphabet produce. Until now, I’ve just shared the oddities that I’ve found at farmers’ markets and in my home garden, but I haven’t sought contributions from the outside world. That’s about to change. As of this very moment, I’m [...]
I may be the last to write about the brilliant Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables campaign from French supermarket chain Intermarché, but I want to say that it’s the best initiative on food waste I’ve seen from one company. Selling ugly (moches) fruits and vegetables at a 30% discount after raising awareness with a line of [...]
The FAO Food Wastage Footprint project released their second video, and it’s a gem. This particular video focuses on trying to calculate the myriad costs of global food waste. Spoiler alert–it’s a lot of money! Nonetheless, the video makes for required viewing.
I just came across this recent EPA infographic on waste and particularly enjoyed this portion: That 95% statistic comes from the EPA’s Municipal Solid Waste report, which shows that composting levels have doubled from 2008 to 2012. (It went from 2.3% to 4.8%.) While those low amounts enable such dramatic improvement, at least we’re improving! I also [...]
