food waste

Among the 40 percent of all food thrown out is this statistic: America’s school lunch programs waste $5 million in food every day. FERN’s latest story, published with Grist, focuses on Nancy Deming of the Oakland Unified School District, a leader in the movement to cut school food waste and redirect the food to students and people in need. Here’s the main take-aways:

Private companies are stepping up to tackle food waste, a new report finds, but governments lag behind in the race to meet a United Nations goal of cutting wasted food in half by 2030. The report was compiled by a coalition of executives and leaders of private companies, non-profits, and government agencies, called Champions 12.3, that work to reduce food waste internationally.

In a study on food waste in the United States, the World Wildlife Fund found that on a specific set of farms in four states, 40 percent of tomatoes, 39 percent of peaches, 56 percent of romaine lettuce, and 2 percent of processing potatoes were left in the field rather than harvested.

Top place in the 2017 Food Sustainability Index goes to a repeat winner, France, followed by Japan, Germany, Spain, and Sweden, says the Economist Intelligence Unit.

In Tucson, the Iskashitaa Refugee Network is helping refugees heal from trauma by gleaning fruit from backyards across the city. “Iskashitaa — which means 'working cooperatively together' in Somali Bantu, the ethnicity of many early volunteers — provides more than just healthy food,” writes Jonathan Bloom in FERN’s latest story, published with NPR’s The Salt.

California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill to encourage manufacturers to voluntarily standardize date labeling on their products in order to curb some of the 5.5 billion tons of food tossed into the state’s landfills each year.

The board of the Consumer Goods Forum, which includes 400 of the biggest goods companies in 70 countries, used Climate Week to call on foodmakers and retailers to standardize the "Sell by," "Use by" and "Best before" labels that confuse consumers and contribute to food waste. The industry "call to action" dovetails with a UN goal of reducing food waste by 50 percent by 2030.

The District of Columbia is following cities like New York and San Francisco in moving toward curb-side pickup of waste for composting, saying about "148,000 tons of organic waste could be composted annually — about 60 percent of the food and yard waste generated in the city each year," the Washington Post reported.

A new bill introduced by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, and Rep. Chellie Pingree, a Maine Democrat, aims to lower food waste nationally by targeting schools and federal food vendors.

Nearly every article on food waste includes these stats: 40 percent of food in this country, worth $165 billion, is wasted each year. But a study from the University of Minnesota’s Department of Applied Economics says that those numbers are only estimates and may actually be inaccurate.

The James Beard Foundation announced six winners of its Leadership Award this this year, saying they are "pioneers in their areas of work, including reducing food waste, environmental protection, local and national advocacy, and workplace safety." The winners are Rep. Chellie Pingree of Maine, chef Dan Barber, author Joan Gussow, food advocate Olivier De Schutter, and the directors of the Food Chain Alliance, Joann Lo and Jose Oliva.

A year ago, as a step against food waste, the French Parliament voted to fine supermarkets that throw away food products that are still edible or can be converted to feed for animals. The supermarkets were expected to make arrangements to donate the items to charities, says Food Navigator, but "many feel that regulation will remain ineffective until government support is provided across the food chain."

The USDA encourages "share tables" as a way to reduce food waste in school meals. The idea is that children can return untouched food and beverages that become available to children who are still hungry, says Civil Eats, "But there has also been some surprising pushback lately."

The welter of product date labels, ranging from "Sell By" to "Use By" and "Expires On" would be reduced to two standard phrases under a voluntary initiative by foodmakers and grocers. The new phrases would be "BEST If Used By," to assure product quality, and "USE By," to prevent perishable foods from going bad before use.

The USDA meat safety agency updated its guidance to foodmakers and retailers to encourage the use of the phrase "Best if used by" on packages that carry a product date. "This new guidance can help consumers save money and curb the amount of wholesome food going in the trash," said Al Almanza, deputy undersecretary for food safety.

Research ecologist Phil Taylor says Americans are great at the farm-to-table side of the food equation "but we're really bad at table to farm" – converting food waste into material that will produce a new round of food. Maggots are the answer, the University of Colorado researcher told Harvest Public Media.

Fifteen companies, ranging from food processors to grocery and fast food chains, make up the inaugural class of "food loss and waste champions," said the EPA and USDA. The companies won the designation by agreeing to reduce food waste 50 percent by 2030, in line with an administration goal to conserve resources and to combat climate change.

An estimated 33 percent — some 78 million tons — of the U.S. food supply is wasted every year, including nearly a pound of food per day in every household. This in a country with some 44 million food insecure people. It’s also a climate problem; all the waste generates methane, a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide. Can’t we just send would-be-wasted food to hungry mouths? Unfortunately, our food system is notoriously inefficient, with waste found on farms, in grocery stores, schools, and our refrigerators.This special six-part series, produced in partnership with Inverse, looks at how data, technology, ingenuity, and common sense can be used to fight this waste. With all these ingredients, and a handful of worms, the solution may be within reach.