By: Emily Grant

Back in 2021, before I joined FoodRecovery.org, my supervisor at the time caught the CNN Heroes clip of MEANS Database (now FoodRecovery.org), and nudged me to follow up. I had never heard of food recovery or food rescue, but quickly realized that this was an important puzzle piece in the local food system. As a Food System Specialist with the University of Florida Family Nutrition Program, this seemed like the perfect match between feeding neighbors and strengthening the local food system.

The landscape:

My home, nestled on the Gulf Coast of Florida, is known for its vacation and beach spots, and a great place to retire. While tourism has boomed, and growth has exploded in the last few years, so has the cost of living and food. Having lived in both Bradenton and Sarasota, there are clear pockets of need.

While funding changes were happening with the Family Nutrition Program, I knew that I wanted to continue this work, as my passion for food recovery only became stronger.

Collaborative solutions:

After joining the FoodRecovery.org team in 2022 and partnering with local organizations like Community Harvest SRQ (previously Transition Sarasota), Honeyside Farms and UF Gulf Coast Research and Education Center, FoodRecovery.org recovered more than 39,000 pounds of fresh produce that otherwise would have been composted or thrown away. Even the Gulf Coast Community Foundation, one of our generous grantors, has donated excess catered food after their events.

During the last two years, we participated in Food Waste Prevention Week, a nation-wide focus on reducing food waste, and had an amazing representation in Florida with webinars, community events and more.

It finally feels like food recovery is catching on in Sarasota and Bradenton.

Project highlight:

Back when I was a Food System Specialist, in the height of the pandemic, I joined the Manatee Feeding Workgroup that focused on feeding the community while so many businesses were shut down. Over the years, the workgroup took on a more long-term approach by developing a local farm stand with Honeyside Farms. In Samoset, a neighborhood in Manatee with few grocery store options, the farm stand would offer discounted fresh produce during season, and anything unsold would be donated to the Food Banks of Manatee (Meals on Wheels PLUS). 

I mean who wouldn’t want some of this fresh produce (pictured below)?

What’s Next?

The beauty of food rescue lies in its inclusivity—everyone can play a part in this transformative journey. Whether as a donor, volunteer, or advocate, each contribution amplifies the impact for folks in Sarasota and Brandeton. From donating excess food to volunteering with us, there are many avenues for engagement, and we invite you to become stewards of change with me.

By Grace Hoening 

I have worked with MEANS since June 2019 when I started as an Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) Outreach intern at the age of 16. My passion for food recovery started at the ELCA World Hunger Leadership Conference. I tagged along with my mom and grew into a passion I wanted to keep pursuing. I was able to hear Maria Rose Belding, one of our co-founders, speak at different events and connected with her because I was instantly inspired by MEANS. It just made sense. There were some minor details I needed to work out such as moving to Washington DC, but I was determined to find a way. After an interview and working out details with Sammie Paul, I was on a flight to DC.

While I was younger than most of my coworkers, I never felt that way. I was always treated as an equal regardless of my age or experience. The work environment that summer and even now while we are virtual is better than I could have asked for. It has given me valuable relationships and life experiences. From working on spreadsheets and making calls to recording for TV shows and spending time with the MEANS team, I am forever grateful for that summer and the memories and experiences that came with it.

My First Work Trip

That summer, I went to a conference in Minnesota. It was such a full circle moment because my coworkers and I were helping Maria Rose write one of her speeches. The summer prior I was sitting in the audience learning about MEANS and now I was getting to help share our story. I also was able to present at the conference with Emily Dwyer and Julia Uricheck. We shared some of the crazy donations we’ve recovered such as ketchup packets or excessive amounts of Gatorade. As a new intern at MEANS, they gave me the opportunity to meet partners and share our story.

When I started working at MEANS we were in an office. Saying goodbye was hard because I didn’t know if I’d ever get to see anyone again. When the world shut down due to COVID-19, MEANS invited me and other previous employees to come back and work online. Over COVID, it gave me a sense of community that I needed and also provided me with things to do when all of my normal high school extracurricular activities were canceled. Now that we are all virtual, I am able to continue working with MEANS 4 years later. 

Personal and Professional Growth

MEANS has helped me grow as a person. Part of that being because I have worked here at a pivotal time of my life from finishing high school all the way through college. It has helped give me professional experience while still having flexibility around my busy college schedule. Over the years, I have been mentored by different team members about working on social media and making graphics to sending emails and fundraising. The MEANS team has both helped me grow as an individual and professional. At MEANS, I’ve always been encouraged to work with my strengths. I’m a music major, so while I’m not writing MEANS a theme song, I am working on creative aspects such as video editing, social media posts, and graphic design. I made Can Man as a joke and now we regularly use him in fundraising and social media. 

MEANS encourages me to use my creativity in different ways every day. It has helped me become the person I am today. Working with MEANS has been an amazing opportunity, I would recommend it to anyone. You might not feel tech savvy or like you don’t know enough about food recovery, but you will learn and there’s an amazing team by your side who is ready to answer any questions. Right now we are moving more food than ever before. We are always accepting volunteers and you can keep your eye out for internship positions with us too! It doesn’t matter your age, if you want to help, we’ll find a way. What matters is that we waste less and feed more, together. 

MEANS Database was created by passionate youth at the beginning of 2015. Co-founder and Chair of the Board Maria Rose was able to build out the beginnings of MEANS because she was afforded opportunities by adults and institutions who took a chance on her as a teenager. Many of the MEANS staff, past and present, also have come to our work as a result of internships, jobs, and other opportunities they were granted to enter the professional world in a meaningful way, sometimes before the end of high school. Many of us are who we are, and are where we are, because of the adults who took chances on us. Now that we are those adults, we prioritize creating opportunities for the young students many of us once were.

Part of our success in the food recovery space is our ability to attract talented and passionate young adults through our Ambassador Program. This past spring we launched our first all-virtual Ambassador Program. The program was a 10 week internship that highlighted different areas of focus including outreach, grant writing, web development, and marketing. The participants’ work has helped us grow our user base, recover food, and create the very blog you are reading now. The ambassadors received real-world experience working with a nonprofit remotely, where they were able to create connections and develop practical experience working in the nonprofit sector. The ambassadors at MEANS Database don’t do busy work, they are fully integrated into our team to help recover extra food in the United States and build connections across the food system .

This experience has allowed for our former ambassadors to go on to continue working with MEANS Database in a part-time role, or other organizations such as the United Nations Foundation, Johnson & Johnson, and JPMorgan Chase. We consistently hear from past interns how their new supervisors are surprised how much autonomy and responsibility they were given while working with us. Not only do we value the ideas of youth at MEANS, we elevate those ideas and allow space for those ideas to become reality. For example, the Ambassador Program started as an idea from a 19 year old intern and has grown into a cornerstone of our work at MEANS.

Everyone should have access to high-quality internships, regardless of where they are geographically or their family’s income. We have chosen to pay our Ambassador Program participants because we want to ensure that no qualified student or young adult is economically forced to turn down an opportunity that they are passionate about, or one that could advance their career because it doesn’t pay the bills. So many of us at MEANS and so many people in the workforce at large have gotten where we are because of experiences and relationships built at the start of our careers.

As an organization founded by teenagers and early twenty-somethings, we know the importance of youth involvement in the efforts to mitigate food insecurity. In order to develop innovative solutions to the gaps in our food system, we collaborate with ambassadors of all backgrounds to brainstorm and test new food recovery approaches.

That’s why this Giving Tuesday, we will be fundraising to support our Ambassadors Program! By participating in Giving Tuesday, donors will be able to support this program and invest in the future of young professionals interested in food security. You can support this program here! 

Today at the World Food Prize Foundation’s Iowa Hunger Summit, MEANS Database announced their acquisition of Des Moines-based food rescue app ChowBank. Since its debut in 2015, ChowBank helped users like Eat Greater Des Moines as the organization rescued nearly twenty million pounds of food that were redirected to feed food insecure Iowans. 

ChowBank’s acquisition provides MEANS Database with a proven, easy to use, food rescue app that can handle the user growth it has achieved through innovative partnerships with organizations like Grubhub. It will help the nonprofit continue to grow and support its nationwide network of users.

“Few get the opportunity to help so many in times of need,” said Draper of ChowBank. “Being able to hand our efforts off so Sammie [Paul] and the MEANS team can maximize ChowBank’s potential is beyond exciting.”

The MEANS Database acquisition of ChowBank will be seamless for current users and organizations, with users and organizations able to donate and accept rescued food as normal. As ChowBank is fully integrated into the MEANS Database technology suite, users will see more options to engage with more communities across the nation.

Frequently Asked Questions

Will users on ChowBank have to sign up for MEANS?

No, your Chowbank account will continue to operate as usual. You can still donate and receive food without signing up for MEANS.

Does MEANS Database serve my area?

MEANS has users in all 50 states, with particular areas that serve as hubs for our food rescue work. To learn about these areas, or to find out how your community can become a hub, read more here.

I’d like to learn more about MEANS and ChowBank and how I can get involved. Who should I contact?

You can email the MEANS team at hello@foodrecovery.org or call them at (202)449-1507.

How can I support the work of MEANS Database?

You can support MEANS by asking your favorite restaurants, grocery stores, and other food producers to join. You can also financially support MEANS by donating here.

For press inquiries contact Zoey Jordan Salsbury at zoey@foodrecovery.org. A press kit with more quotes, photos, and logos available here: https://m-db.co/chowbank-means-press-kit

Food insecurity is a problem all over the United States: in 2018 food insecurity affects 1 in 9 Americans. However over the year due to COVID-19 that number has increased to 1 in 4 households in the United States. College students are no exception when it comes to food insecurity. Food insecurity means being without a reliable source of food that is affordable and nutritious.

A study done from 2015 to 2019 shows that between 2 year institutions and 4 year institutions, about 43% of students consider themselves food insecure, which is about four times the food insecurity rate among the general United States population. And you may be wondering how this happens when most college campuses have campus dining halls. Well the answer is actually quite simple: a lot of college students just can’t afford the food. Many college students are coming from families where they are the first generation of college students and don’t have outside monetary support for the extra costs of food on campus. First generation college students of color are at particular at-risk to being food insecure. The COVID-19 pandemic has only made this problem more prolific. In 2020 with 18-24 year olds seeing unprecedented rates of unemployment, some college students had to relocate from campus which made it difficult for some to access the meal plans that they had already paid for, leaving them with fewer options and more vulnerable to being food insecure.

However there is some hope for college students. The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, has temporarily expanded SNAP to college students due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was implemented on January 16, 2021. The new temporary rules expand who is eligible for SNAP: before students were only eligible if they participated in a federally funded work study, however now it has changed to include students who are eligible for work study, along with students who are receiving the maximum amount of the Pell Grant. City of New York University, the University of Washington, and Many more colleges now offering to help students sign up for SNAP. This is a small step in helping to ensure college students have access to affordable and nutritious foods. Food insecurity in students is linked to having higher perceived stress, lower quality in and sleep, and lower grades than students who aren’t food insecure. This is a problem that isn’t going to go away with a temporary solution, and as the cost of tuition continues to rise in this country, there doesn’t seem to be a clear answer on how to tackle food insecurity for college students. If we want to help students succeed academically, we need to help them outside of the academic sphere.

By: Olivia Handman

MEANS Ambassador

Sources:

Feeding America: What is Food Insecurity

Hope4College: #RealCollege 2020: Five Years of Evidence on Campus Basic Needs Insecurity

Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior: Addressing College Food Insecurity

Journalist Resource: College student hunger: How access to food can impact grades, mental health

NPR: Food Insecurity In The U.S. By The Numbers

USDA: Students and SNAP

In 2010, the United States estimated the value of food wasted that year at 161 billion USD, comprising nearly one-quarter of all food produced in the United States (USDA, 2020). The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) estimate is the approximate fair market value of the food wasted. This value does not include the cost of transportation from the farm to a retailer or from the retailer to the landfill, and the cost of maintaining said landfills, the cumulative cost of resources expended to grow the food, and all other intricate supply chain costs associated with food waste. Currently, there is no federal requirement, mandate, law, or code to divert apparently wholesome food from landfills and dumps. While millions of pounds of food are wasted, millions of Americans remain food insecure. Every year since 2008 food insecurity has affected at least 10% of the population, which was approximately 35 million Americans in 2019 (USDA, 2020). If food insecurity could be mitigated by diverting a percentage of the food wasted annually, then those existing resources should be mobilized.

Food insecurity drastically rose during the COVID-19 pandemic. US adults without children typically have higher food security rates than the national average, however in 2020 a United States Census Bureau survey of 63,000 US residents estimated adults facing food insecurity reached 10% and more than 32% of adults reported not receiving adequate nutrition. According to the National Institutes of Health, 14% of families, including 13 million children, were already food insecure, and COVID-19 halted many traditional avenues for receiving and using benefits and other means of mitigating food insecurity (NIH, 2020). As COVID-19 necessitated lockdowns across the US, state and local governments scrambled to create online sign-ups for federal food assistance programs, and over 30 states announced their online portals in 2020 (USCB, 2020; NIH, 2020). While more and more Americans faced food insecurity, even more wholesome food was being wasted. Americans were shocked as images of humongous piles of potatoes being wasted and fields of vegetables being plowed over were broadcasted on the news (Business Insider, 2020; NY Times, 2020). A lack of infrastructure to mitigate product dumping and a shortage of labor to harvest produce due to the pandemic led to tons of additional food waste. 

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits continue to be insufficient in closing the food insecurity gap; donation to emergency food providers serving those facing food insecurity is crucial, especially in the face of an ongoing pandemic. Since there is plenty of wholesome food ending up in landfills throughout the country due to infrastructural issues and a lack of public policy, emphasis should be placed upon incentivizing the donation of food because currently it is far easier to dump food and write-off an inventory loss without repercussions. 

About 3 million tons of food are donated out of the total 229 million tons produced and 151 million tons consumed. More than one-third of food produced in the United States is wasted, leaving 54 million tons of food as garbage. Food waste makes up 24% of our landfill inputs, putting a drain on finite resources like agricultural freshwater and 14% of farmland. In 2019, food waste in landfills alone accounted for 258 billion USD (refed.org, 2020). Fortunately, in some states, laws are changing in order to alter the equitability of food access by encouraging donation and placing more restrictions on waste.

The existing federal legislation protects food donations from any organization to any non-profit organization. The Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Act, the federal legislation that protects those donating food in good faith, cannot be superseded by any local jurisdiction. It protects non-profits which serve food and donors to those organizations from liability regarding food that is donated in good faith. Food donated in this way can be recorded as a charitable donation instead of a loss. Unfortunately, the existence of protections and tax incentives has not been enough to encourage major producers within the supply chain to donate their food waste.

With this, California and New York have both passed laws requiring major food producers and retailers that have more than two tons of food waste must donate their excess food and recycle any food scraps (ca.gov; ny.gov, 2020). California, the largest agricultural producer in the United States, in the midst of a water crisis, is aware that one of the largest drains on their infrastructure is the discrepancy between their agricultural production and waste (CDFA, 2020). Since the state produces significantly more food than its population consumes, is a net exporter of agricultural products globally, and still has 14 million people facing food insecurity, the waste problem lies in the existing supply chain. 

California’s SB 1383 has two phases of action. The first, which takes effect January 1, 2022, will require food producers, including wholesalers, supermarkets, distributors, and food service providers, to donate all excess wholesome grocery products to non-profit organizations. The focus of the initial phase targets rescuing fresh food, produce, and shelf-stable items. The second phase focuses on larger caterers and producers who have existing prepared meals which require more infrastructure or special handling.

“SB 1383 requires certain food businesses to donate the maximum amount of edible food they would otherwise dispose of, to food recovery organizations. The law phases food donors in under two tiers. The first tier is required to donate starting in 2022. The second tier is required to donate starting in 2024.”

New York State developed a nearly identical policy to take effect at the same time as California’s first phase of SB1383.  New York’s legislation notably does not require “hospitals, nursing homes, adult care facilities, K-12 schools, and farms” to donate their food waste.

“Effective January 1, 2022, the NYS Food Donation and Food Scraps Recycling law requires businesses and institutions that generate an annual average of two tons of wasted food per week or more must:

1. donate excess edible food; and

2. recycle all remaining food scraps if they are within 25 miles of an organics recycler (composting facility, anaerobic digester, etc.)”

Food insecurity is obviously not limited to the United States, nor is the global supply chain separate from global politics. The health and economic crisis of COVID-19 did not inspire a push for a global safety net, nor a national one. The pandemic exacerbated all of the problems that the existing food system was facing, seldom producing new solutions. SB1383 in California and the New York State Food Donation and Food Scraps Recycling law are excellent first steps in creating protections to fill the gaps in the food system. However, protections are one action, the actual change in access comes from producers having efficient means of transporting food to emergency food providers, such as food banks and food pantries.

A 2017 study from Syracuse University found that, “the recovery and redirection of an additional 15% of the present stock of edible food waste would meet 35% of the caloric needs of all Americans living in a food insecure household or very low food security household” (Walia and Sanders, 2017). As demonstrated by this study, the mitigation of food waste and food insecurity can go hand-in-hand, if public policies and private actions prioritized it. There is limited impact that can be made without action from players within the existing food system and legislators advocating for sustainability policies like those in New York and California. The rest has to be taken up by individuals and groups who care enough to use those policies to their advantage to shape a better system. If our society collectively decides to act, both public and private, to make sure that wholesome food goes to those who need it, and not into landfills, we could feed more and waste less.

by Oliver Johnson

Project Coordinator and Policy Researcher

Sources:

USDA: Food Availability Data System

USDA Household Food Security in the United States in 2019

NIH: COVID-19 and Food Insecurity: an Uneven Patchwork of Responses

Business Insider: Why Potato Farmers are Stuck with Millions of Pounds of Potatoes

NYT: Food Waste of the Pandemic

refed.org: IMPACT OF UNEATEN FOOD

NY.GOV: Food Donation and Food Scraps Recycling Law

CA.GOV: CalRecycle Program SB1383

CA.GOV: AB-1219 Existing Protections for Food Donation in California 

US Census Bureau: Household Survey May 2020

CA.GOV: California Dept. of Food and Agriculture

Indigenous communities, although only making up 2% of the overall US population, have some of the highest rates of food insecurity in the nation. Generally, one out of every nine Americans have experienced food insecurity, however, one out of four Indigenous persons can say the same. This stems from a systematic oppression and othering done by the US government, which leaves these communities substantially more prone to poverty, diet-related diseases, and lack of access to nutritional food. Across the nation, the food insecurity rate for Indigenous persons is about 25%, however in specific areas, for example in northern California and southern Oregon, studies have displayed that this rate could be as high as 92%. Although federal programs have attempted to address this issue through programs such as the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR), the lack of nutritional and culturally appropriate food is still pressing.  

Furthermore, even though Indigenous communities do receive assistance from programs such as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR), SNAP is ultimately ineffective because of the lack of large grocers who accept SNAP in these areas. Indigenous communities often have a low population density, and high poverty rate, once again due to systematic and institutional discrimination, and because of this, large grocery corporations usually do not establish a presence in these areas. The lack of support from the federal government, as a whole, even past the issue of food insecurity, and the gaps in federal food distribution programs, has been unable to fill the food insecurity gap present in indigenous communities. Thus, indigenous activists, community leaders, and scholars have emphasized food sovereignty as an essential means of dealing with this disparity. Food sovereignty, in comparison to food security, addresses the issue of food insecurity from a systemic approach. Understanding that food insecurity stems from inequality and lack of resources, a food sovereignty approach focuses on the creation of nutritious, culturally appropriate food that is created for and by the communities served. Through food sovereignty, solutions and alternatives to the current food distributions that are in place are proposed and tailored to the needs of individual communities. The ability of these communities to be able to traditionally manage their own land, further cultivate traditional crops for food or medicinal purposes, protection of cultural resources, and increased autonomy, is essential in assisting the process towards food sovereignty. 

As a whole, Indigenous communities are forced to carry the burden of food insecurity without government support, which has led to these issues with food insecurity. It is essential that the intensity of the issues being faced by these communities is known, as well as the lack of resources that they have access to. Supporting a transition towards food sovereignty is the best means to address the present food insecurity present in indigenous communities, but in order to support this transition, one must be aware of the challenges faced by Indigenous communities in order to advocate for and affirm the desires presented by them as this issue is dealt with.

By Ireland Griffin

Works Cited:

Decolonizing Food Systems: Food Sovereignty, Indigenous Revitalization, and Agroecology as Counter-Hegemonic Movements 

November is Native American Heritage Month

Indigenous peoples and food insecurity

First Nations Food Environments: Exploring the Role of Place, Income, and Social Connection

Giving voice to food insecurity in a remote indigenous community in subarctic Ontario, Canada: traditional ways, ways to cope, ways forward

Indigenous Food Security is Dependent on Food Sovereignty 

Food Insecurity among American Indians and Alaska Natives: A National Profile using the Current Population Survey–Food Security Supplement 

Food security and access to healthy foods in Indian country: Learning from the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations 

You heard it here first folks, we’re launching a blog! We have so many talented staff and Ambassadors (interns) who have amazing ideas and research to share with the broader anti-hunger community, and we wanted to give them a space to do that.

This blog will contain articles that tell the history of the anti-hunger movement, personal stories about working in the food recovery space, the food system, and much more. We want to create a space for learning and growth, among our team and the community.

We will start this blog with some amazing posts written by our Spring Ambassadors. All seven Ambassadors have spent these last few months doing incredible outreach for our team while also learning about the food recovery space at a hands-on level. We are honored to have the opportunity to share some of their work with all of you.

We’re excited to begin this new chapter with you, and we hope you’ll join us on this journey. You can sign up for email alerts about new posts here, or just check the website on a regular basis!