{"id":15963,"date":"2013-02-06T16:28:01","date_gmt":"2013-02-06T21:28:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=15963"},"modified":"2013-02-25T10:35:53","modified_gmt":"2013-02-25T15:35:53","slug":"like-emu-maryland-texas-and-brown-students-convey-unused-food-to-charities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2013\/like-emu-maryland-texas-and-brown-students-convey-unused-food-to-charities\/","title":{"rendered":"Like EMU, Maryland, Texas and Brown Students Convey Unused Food to Charities"},"content":{"rendered":"

[EDITOR’S NOTE: The following article published recently in The Washington Post and Daily News Record called to mind that EMU students have been doing this work since 2008<\/a>, taking up to 150 pounds of food per week to the Salvation Army<\/a> and Our Community Place<\/a> in Harrisonburg.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Not to make you feel guilty, but think for a minute about what you threw out of your refrigerator this week: that wilted lettuce, the yogurt that had passed its expiration date, the Tupperware full of mac and cheese that the kids had to have but nev\u00ader finished. It adds up.<\/p>\n

Now imagine the amount of wasted food in a huge cafeteria that serves thousands of meals each day, a place like the South Campus Dining Room at the Uni\u00adversity of Maryland. That\u2019s what three students did one day back in 2010. The quantities of soup, roast turkey, pasta and salads were so jaw-dropping, they decided to do something about it. They created the Food Recovery Network<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Initially, the project was limited in scope, remembers 23-year-old Ben Simon, the network\u2019s co-\u00adfounder and executive director. Once a week, five volunteers would show up at the south cam\u00adpus dining hall to pick up leftovers and drive them to area shelters. Even that modest effort yielded huge hauls of food, an average of 150 to 200 pounds each night. By 2012 graduation, the network had donated about 30,000 meals to Washington shelters.<\/p>\n

Still not content, the network began working with other univer\u00adsities to start their own recovery programs. Last year, students at 12 campuses \u201crescued\u201d 120,000 pounds of food, mostly from dining halls but, in some cases, from off\u00ad-campus restaurants and other venues.<\/p>\n

Ending food wastage<\/h3>\n

Food waste is shaping up to be a big issue in 2013. The numbers show why. Americans throw out 40 percent of their food, according to a recent report from the National Resources Defense Council<\/a>. That is more than 20 pounds of food per person per month, a total of $165 billion worth of food each year. In food service alone, including restaurants and cafeterias, waste accounts for $8 billion to $20 bil\u00adlion, according to LeanPath<\/a>, a company that provides automated food waste tracking systems.<\/p>\n

Food recovery isn\u2019t new, of course. DC Central Kitchen<\/a>, a nonprofit organization that serves meals to the needy and provides culinary job training in Washing\u00adton, is a pioneer in food rescue; last year, its Campus Kitchens Project<\/a>, in which students trans\u00adform unused fresh food from din\u00ading halls, grocery stores, restau\u00adrants and farmers markets into meals, recovered more than 400,000 pounds of food. But bring\u00ading food recovery to more colleges is important, says Dana Gunders, the author of the National Re\u00adsources Defense Council report.<\/p>\n

\u201cWasting food is a learned be\u00adhavior,\u201d she said, noting that the amount Americans throw away has increased by 50 percent since the 1970s. \u201cBy recovering food on college campuses, it trains young people to be aware of this issue. Just having it on the radar will help people make the right choices.\u201d<\/p>\n

University of Maryland Dining Services was aware that it was wasting food, says Bart Hipple, its assistant director of communi\u00adcations. It had removed trays from one of its dining halls, a popular strategy on college cam\u00adpuses that discourages students from taking more than they need and reduces energy and water consumption because the trays don\u2019t have to be washed. But until the Food Recovery Network students showed up, there was no easy way to donate leftovers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe could not find an organization to come get it. And we\u2019re not in the business of [ delivering] food somewhere,\u201d Hipple said. The Food Recovery Network \u201ccame in and saw a problem, a problem we were aware of that we could not solve. They removed a lot of the roadblocks and fought to a solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Relying on student volunteers<\/h3>\n

The Food Recovery Network\u2019s success is rooted in its structure. The group doesn\u2019t rely on one team of volunteers to make its late- night pickups and deliveries. Instead, it taps into the dozens of student organizations on campus, including religious and cultural groups, fraternities and sororities, many of which require members to perform community service. More than 200 volunteers pick up at dining halls and after football and basketball games. A manager with food- safety training oversees each pickup, and all volunteers receive lessons in safe- food handling, including the importance of wearing gloves, keeping foods within prescribed temperatures and other precautions.<\/p>\n

One of the beneficiaries is the Christian Life Center of Riverdale, Md<\/a>., just over a mile from the College Park campus. Students drop off food there twice a week and after sporting events. \u201cYou can feed 1,000 people with the food from a football game,\u201d says pastor Ben Slye. \u201cHundreds of chicken sandwiches, hamburgers, hot dogs.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also a good supply of more-healthful food. Slye, who takes photos of every recovery, sees trays of steak, chicken, tuna, salmon, pasta salads, fruit, \u201ceverything you can think of.\u201d The center feeds 400 people a week: twice a month at its headquarters and at several partner soup kitchens to which it delivers food. (It also has its own food recovery program; each week it picks up and distributes as much as 25,000 pounds of fresh produce from distributor Taylor Farms.)<\/p>\n

\u201cI am just amazed by these kids,\u201d Slye says. \u201cThey take their own time, their own vehicles, their own money for gas. And they are so committed. They have a tight schedule. They are always there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Giving to people in need<\/h3>\n

The network now includes chapters at Brown University, the Rhode Island School of Design and University of Texas at Austin. Still, notes director Simon, as many as 75 percent of college campuses have no food recovery program in place. He says that adds up to 22 million meals that could be given to people in need.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to unite colleges that do have programs and build a movement at colleges that don\u2019t,\u201d he says. \u201cWe envision the end of unnecessary food waste.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a lofty goal. But there may be another measure of success: putting yourself out of a job. Eighteen months after they began, University of Maryland students no longer pick up at the South Campus dining hall after waste there virtually disappeared. Administrators, who are now paying closer attention to food waste, decided to extend the dining hall\u2019s hours so that it now sells out of many of its prepared meals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to give them some of the credit for it,\u201d said the dining services\u2019 Hipple. \u201cWe became more aware, and we figured out a way to make change.\u201d<\/p>\n

Courtesy Daily News Record, Feb. 6, 2013. Originally published in the Washington Post<\/a> on Jan. 29, 2013.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[EDITOR’S NOTE: The following article published recently in The Washington Post and Daily News Record called to mind that EMU students have been doing this work since 2008, taking up ... read more about Like EMU, Maryland, Texas and Brown Students Convey Unused Food to Charities<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":16001,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5583,5643],"tags":[14768,17224,11964],"feature":[],"class_list":["post-15963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-community","category-environmental-sustainability","tag-food-recovery-network","tag-sustainability","tag-wasted-food"],"yoast_head":"\nLike EMU, Maryland, Texas and Brown Students Convey Unused Food to Charities - EMU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2013\/like-emu-maryland-texas-and-brown-students-convey-unused-food-to-charities\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Like EMU, Maryland, Texas and Brown Students Convey Unused Food to Charities - 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