Feedback is committed to shedding light on the global food waste scandal and enacting tasty solutions to combat it. Of course, we aren’t the only ones. Each Friday we will be bringing you #fightfoodwastefriday, giving our supporters the chance to gain a new perspective on the global fight against food waste. We’ll also give you a short update of what Feedback has been up to over the past week.

Feedback Weekly Update

One week ago, on World Food Day The Urban Food Policy Pact launched. The International pact with over 100 cities, including London, commits urban areas to create more sustainable and equitable food systems. The pact also calls for coordination on international food polices and the need for leadership in achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal to halve food waste by 2030.

Feeding the 5000

In celebration of World Food Day and the signing of this very important pact, there were two Feeding the 5000 events. Both events showcased the tasty solutions to food waste by preparing, in combination, 10,000 meals for the public from food that would otherwise be thrown away.

Feeding the 5000 Warsaw rescued 4,200 KG of food from going to waste, with  3,000 KG of potatoes donated to the Warsaw Food Bank. Together with partners and amazing volunteers the event served 5000 portions of the main meal and gave away 600 KG of food through Disco chopping, workshops and grocery giveaways.

Here’s a video of ‘Fasolki’ (little beans) warming up to perform their food themed songs on the big day:

Feeding the 5000 Milan was a great success, already running out of food by 3:00PM. The volunteers and food waste warriors saved 2,437 kg of food from going to waste.

Have a look at the day here:

Both events also saw great pitches from The Food Surplus Entrepreneurs Network for some exciting new projects combating food waste. If you or someone you know is interested in learning how to “pay yourself a salary while reducing food waste” consider joining the Food Waste Collab in Bern on 11/11/15. More information here.

 Gleaning Network

Last week the Gleaning Network coordinated 0.8 tonnes of pears from packhouse waste to be picked up by the charity FareShare.

There was also an apple glean in Kent, where the team rescued 1.8 tonnes of apples and plums, equal to over 22,500 portions from going to waste. These apples were going to waste merely for being too small or the wrong colour for retailers! Approximately 150 kilos were transported by James from CFE to Food for All to take to refugees in Calais.

Finally, in other news from the food waste fighting community…

Say ‘I Do’ to Food Waste

When you think of weddings, food waste doesn’t exactly come to mind. But for Paul and Katherine Maxell-Rose it certainly did. The couple wanted an ethical wedding in order to reflect their values and with 15 million tonnes of food being thrown away every year in the UK alone, food sourcing for their big day presented some even bigger questions.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation “roughly one-third of the edible parts of food produced for human consumption, gets lost or wasted globally, which is about 1.3 billion ton per year.” At the same time over 800 million people endure hunger globally. There is deprivation in a sea of plenty. So what does an ethical catering company look like?

Save the Date Café is a part of The Real Junk Food Project, a Leeds based project between caterers and activists working to change the food system. Save the Date Café rescues perfectly edible food destined for landfill from restaurants and supermarkets. They then cook up healthy and delicious meals on a pay-what-you-feel basis. In its first 3 months of opening last year, the café rescued 1 tonne of food waste from going to landfill. The Save the Date Café has been been doing tremendous work ever since, and Feedback are lucky to be the café’s neighbours.

There is a vast amount of perfectly edible food that will get tossed even before it makes it to supermarket shelves. In the UK businesses throw out over 7 million tonnes of food annually, before it even gets to the consumer – that’s enough to feed 10 million people.

With so much food going to waste, the fact is food waste shouldn’t be thought of as waste at all. We should think of it as something special– like wild mushroom goulash, char-grilled mixed vegetable skewers, sweet and sour pomegranate rice and vegetable flan. That was what Save the Date Café cooked from food that would have otherwise gone to waste on Paul and Katherine’s special day.

Stay tuned for next weeks Fight Food Waste Friday for more news and updates from the Feedback Team.

Food Waste was on the agenda for World Food Day 2015 on 16/10. The Urban Food Policy Pact was signed into action and Feeding the 5000 Milan and Feeding the 5000 Warsaw were held on the same day. Activity was abundant here at Feedback! Read our latest World Food Day Newsletter to find out what else Feedback’s been busy working on.

No more food waste by French supermarkets? Not quite.

*****Please note: The amdendment discussed in this post was struck down on procedural grounds, but will be brought up again soon. Stay tuned for an update.******

France’s National Assembly recently approved an amendment to its energy transition law forcing supermarkets to strive to eliminate back of store waste. This is a good first step, but it leaves much to be desired.

Although it is crucial to reduce waste of edible food in stores, most food waste happens further up the supermarket supply chains. Moreover, the amendment may lead to higher levels of composting and anaerobic digestion of food waste, whereas what is really needed is diversion of food waste towards charitable redistribution and livestock feed.

The amendment takes a multi-pronged approach to reducing food waste from supermarkets.

The headline news is retailers must strive to prevent waste by donating surplus food, sending it to animal feed processors, or using it for composting and anaerobic digestion. Also, markets that are 400 square metres or more must formally link with a food redistribution charity to facilitate food donations, or face penalties including fines of up to €75,000 (£53,000) or two years in jail.

Other important components of the law:

* Suppliers will be able to donate products that are returned to them, instead of needing to destroy those products.

* There are provisions to include education about food waste in school curricula.

* Supermarkets are prohibited from poisoning food that they do throw away, a practice that has attracted widespread attention. “It’s scandalous to see bleach being poured into supermarket dustbins along with edible foods,” said Guillame Garot, who co-wrote the amendment and has worked with Feedback over the past three years.

This amendment only begins to address supermarkets’ role in creating food waste.

Through years of research and campaigning on food waste and via our Gleaning Network UK campaign, which organises groups of volunteers to save food from going to waste on farms and donates it to food redistribution charities, we have witnessed first-hand supermarket policies that drive up farm-level food waste. Cosmetic standards imposed by retailers lead to fruit and vegetables of the “wrong” size and shape being wasted in huge quantities despite increasing evidence that consumers would buy misshapen fruit and veg. Farmers also complain about having to systematically overproduce to ensure they are not penalised for not meeting supermarket orders. And, supermarkets change their orders at the last minute, leaving waste on their suppliers’ hands.

The same asymmetric relationship between supermarkets and farmers also causes food waste on farms in other countries. Earlier this year, Feedback did grassroots research in Kenya and uncovered how the policies of European supermarkets and their direct suppliers cause Kenyan smallholders to waste around 40% of what they grow for European markets – even in a country with millions of hungry people.

Supermarkets drive waste in the consumption stage of the food supply chain, too. Stores create the image of cornucopian abundance that they believe consumers need to see. A hard-wired human response to glut is to take more: this is the marketing technique that results in us buying far more food than we’re going to eat, week after week.

This amendment does not address the outsize role supermarkets play in driving food waste across all stages of the food supply chain.

This amendment gives supermarkets too much leeway on how to divert their waste

In addition to only beginning to address supermarkets’ role in creating food waste across the food supply chain, this amendment allows supermarkets to consider composting and anaerobic digestion of food waste to count towards “zero food waste.” This is problematic because if food is safe and edible for people to eat, it is more calorically, environmentally, and economically efficient to use it for those purposes than to harvest it for energy and compost. Even if it is not fit for human consumption, it can still be a great source of calories for livestock. Tristram Stuart, Feedback’s founder, calculates that it’s up to 500 times better for the environment, in terms of greenhouse gas emissions diverted, to divert food waste to pigs rather than sending it to AD. Anaerobic digestion is better than landfill, but “better than landfill” is far from the best we can do.

The fact that this amendment mandates that supermarkets formally partner with food redistribution charities goes a way towards encouraging using surplus food to feed people in need. However, as currently written, the amendment does not mandate that surplus food be used in this way whenever possible.

A corollary to this point is that the law mandates that supermarkets “strive” to eliminate food waste – it does not “ban” supermarket food waste, as some media have erroneously reported.

The amendment is a victory, but we must not rest on our laurels. This amendment is a great start, and we are celebrating. However, it is only a start. France still must address its supermarkets’ relationship with farmers, other suppliers, and consumers. And supermarkets must be encouraged not to react to this law by going all-in for anaerobic digestion; instead, they must make a concerted effort to use surplus food to feed those who need it, where possible, and feed livestock as a backup option.

On a chilly day in November a year ago we wrapped up warm and kicked off The Pig Idea with a feast of waste-fed pork for 1000’s. Together we reignited the debate on how we can get more food waste fed to farmed animals, keeping it where it should be – in the food chain.

9,000 pioneering people have signed our petition to get those in the business of selling food to stop throwing it away.

Can you help us make it 10,000?

Next year we’ll hand our petition directly to the biggest food businesses in Europe, putting pressure on them keep food where it should be, in the food chain. Together we can stop good food going to waste.

Please sign The Pig Idea Petition to get food producers and retailers sending more of their waste to feed animals – like you, we want food businesses to take food waste seriously.

We’re making great progress, but we need your help

In the last few months we’ve stopped more than 500 tonnes of food from going to waste each year. Working with UK charity Sustain on the brilliant FoodSave* project we’re linking up food businesses in London with local farmers hungry for feed for their even hungrier livestock.

We simply can’t keep chopping down rain forests to grow crops, that could be fed to humans, to feed animals. Feeding food waste to farmed animals makes sense on so many levels.

Right now, millions of tonnes of good food fit for animal feed, like bread-crusts from sandwich factories, brewer’s grains and nutritious whey from cheese makers, end up in bins across Europe.

Together we can stop good food going to waste. Please take two minutes to:

1. Sign The Pig Idea petition to get food businesses sending more food waste to feed farmed animals
2. Walk the talk, tweet the tweet – Food doesn’t belong in the bin! Sign @ThePigIdea petition to get retailers sending more food to feed farmed animals – http://thepigidea.org/get-involved.html
3. Spread the word. Tell one person, on the bus, in the pub, at work, about The Pig Idea. One conversation can spark 1000’s more.

*FoodSave is a Greater London Authority programme delivered by the Sustainable Restaurant Association and Sustain. The programme is funded by the European Regional Development Fund, London Waste and Recycling Board and the Mayor of London.

Feedback will be creating a feast for 500 TEDx Nairobi delegates made from perfectly good food grown by Kenyan farmers but rejected by UK and EU supermarkets due to cosmetic imperfections or because of last minute order cancellations.

The Feedback team has uncovered shocking levels of food waste in Kenya caused by standard practices of European and UK retailers. Farmers are faced with overly restrictive cosmetic standards on the appearance of produce and have orders cancelled at the last minute and often after the produce has been flown in to Europe. Many small farmers end up bearing the financial cost of these practices, suffering significant hardship as a result.

As the retailers do not pay for any of the costs of this waste, they have little incentive to reduce it, and farmers are forced to cover the cost of the fertilizer, agricultural inputs and labour for large harvests they cannot sell. One Kenyan farmer called this ‘psychological torture’ for the farm workers.

In a country where 30 percent of children are undernourished, 10 million people suffer from food shortages and poor nutrition and 3 million people are dependent on food aid, it is impossible to justify wasting thousands of tonnes of produce due to these unfair trading practices. As demand for luxury horticultural exports is rapidly increasing, greater numbers of suppliers will be affected by these unfair trade practices not just in Kenya but across Africa.

The TEDx Nairobi event, in association with Feedback and The Rockefeller Foundation, aims to highlight the many solutions to this type of food waste. It will show that food waste is a tragedy that can be turned into a huge opportunity to increase on-farm incomes for rural communities and increase food availability where it is needed most whilst also reducing the environmental impact of food production. Developing secondary markets within Africa and increasing demand for quality produce that is currently rejected is one way of reducing food waste and at the same time increasing urban food security in Kenyan cities.

Shocking facts on Food Waste in Kenya

1.  A basil farmer visited by Feedback reports 80% rejection due to cosmetic standards including stems being too thick.

2. An avocado exporter reports regular wastage of over a third of avocados due to minor skin blemishes.

3. Green beans often have to be cut to 9cm to fit in the packaging required by retailers, meaning that around a third of each bean is trimmed off and wasted – in the best case this material is fed to animals.

The Feedback team will source around 1,600 kilogrammes of unwanted fruit and vegetables for the meal and for donation to local charities.

The TEDx event has already inspired further action against food waste in Kenya; a coalition of grassroots organisations will be launching the first ever Disco Soup event in Kenya on December 7^th.  Disco Soups are free, collaborative events that celebrate the solutions to food waste. After saving delicious fresh food that otherwise would have been wasted, volunteers come together to cut, chop, peel, cook, eat and party to the sound of dance music by DJs and local bands.  Full details here.