As a “local activist” myself, I want to work to bring social change in my community by collaborating with local individuals through this blog. As advocates for decreasing food insecurity, we must be aware of what we want our goals to be so we know where to start with our actions. So, the question is, where do we start? Well, it's important to realize the impact we can make as a community by implementing small changes in our daily lives, however, we also need to be aware of the negative impact we have on food insecurity if we don't start to make those changes. While bad weather and overproduction can cause food loss in grocery stores, “overbuying, poor planning and confusion over labels and safety contribute to food waste at stores and in homes” (GRACE Communications Foundation, 2022, para. 1), which contributes to food insecurity. In today’s world, there have been various reports that expose the vast quantity of food humans waste every year, which could be conserved to feed hungry families. According to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (2022), Californians throw away approximately 6 million tons of food every year and The Food and Agricultural Organization would even go as far as to say that “¼ of food wasted each year could feed all of the world’s hungry people- and a few more” (SDG2 Advocacy Hub, 2018, para. 1).
READ MORE ABOUT FOOD WASTE HERE.
Food waste starts at the grocery store, but there tends to be some misalignment between potential stakeholders here which are our local grocery stores and consumers in our local communities. Grocery stores prioritize making a profit and getting rid of food with the earliest Best if Use By/Before dates and consumers want to make sure they are equipped with enough food to last them months – and getting it for a bargained deal does not hurt either – or so they think. When we take our weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly grocery shopping trips, some of us tend to overbuy because we fear being hungry and food running out or we can’t turn down a good deal which drives us to buy more products. We may have every intention of eating the 3 packages of pasta we got in a 3 for $3 deal, but there is only so much pasta a person can eat and it either ends up in the garbage or collecting dust in the back of our pantry. The next thing you know, a single mother of two children goes on her grocery trip with the intention of buying pasta because it is probably one of the only inexpensive foods she can afford; yet, due to individuals who stockpile, the pasta is sold out and she goes home empty-handed, not knowing where she and her children’s next meal is coming from. I cannot imagine being in the shoes of a person struggling with food insecurity and experiencing this disheartening disappointment due to someone else’s greed and selfishness. This scenario does not reflect the ethical and moral values I or other advocates of hunger possess, which are being empathetic to others’ realities and being selfless by considering other individuals’ needs. Being selfless means we think more about others’ needs and less about our own–Yes, having 3 backup jars of pasta sauce might bring you comfort and help you feel prepared, but consider how much more someone struggling with hunger might need it. Show empathy by placing yourself in a hungry person’s shoes to understand what they might think and feel.
There is a pressing need for consumers to take the necessary actions that are required to prevent food from being wasted at home so that food insecure individuals can have access to it; this begins with consumers changing their relationship with food–they must keep in mind the risk of food waste when they buy foods in bulk. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (2022), this pressing need can be addressed by planning meals ahead of time and only buying food products that are necessary for those meals. Following a “first in, first out” accounting method can also be applied in the home which means using your oldest product first to avoid having to throw out expired, uneaten foods (For more tips on how consumers can reduce food waste, click here). An example of this can be used by a discussion that was prompted by my manager to our whole team at work. She realized that while conducting our store’s waste audit, a contributing factor was that our oldest inventory was not being sold first, which caused it to expire and be thrown out. “To ensure using food prior to expiration focus your choices on the FIFO principle by consuming the earliest purchased food items and whose shelf life is the shortest, first” (Haraminac, 2014, para. 2).
CALL TO ACTION! For the sake of those that suffer from hunger, I urge you to read the SDG2 article about food waste in order to understand the impact you have on world hunger. Refer to the tips below to see what effective changes you can make in your own home to help food insecure individuals gain more access to food.
Information references:
California Department of Food and Agriculture. (2022). Food recovery. CDFA. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://www.cdfa.ca.gov/is/foodrecovery/
GRACE Communications Foundation. (2022, March 15). The problem of food waste. FoodPrint. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://foodprint.org/issues/the-problem-of-food-waste/
Haraminac, E. (2018, September 20). Keep Food Safe by implementing the "FIFO" system. MSU Extension. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/keep_food_safe_by_implementing_the_fifo_system
SDG2 Advocacy Hub. (2018, April 4). Food waste in a food insecure world. SDG2 Advocacy Hub. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://www.sdg2advocacyhub.org/news/food-waste-food-insecure-world
United States Environmental Protection Agency. (2022, March 24). EPA. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://www.epa.gov/recycle/preventing-wasted-food-home
Image source:
Santillan, J. (2022). Original text. Image created using: https://crello.com at March 29, 2022
