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How much of your food and money are you literally throwing away? The Food Recovery Challenge, part of the Sustainable Materials Management Program, challenges participants to reduce as much of their food waste as possible — saving money, helping communities, and protecting the environment.
How to Participate...
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- Sign Up through WasteWise. Once you are a WasteWise partner, you can join the Food Recovery Challenge by signing into WasteWise Re-TRAC, clicking on “Organization Information”, and selecting the “Food Recovery Challenge” checkbox.
- Assess It! Submit your baseline data into WasteWise Re-TRAC within 90 days of joining. Re-TRAC is a web-based data management and reporting system that will track your organization’s waste generation and reduction activities, including changes in purchasing, food donation, and composting.
- Commit to It! Set a three year goal for reducing the amount of food waste reaching landfills.
- Do It! Undertake activities to reduce your food waste. Examples are modifying food purchasing, changing food production and handling practices, reducing excessive portion size, donations to those in need, and composting/anaerobic digestion. (Learn more about food waste reduction and recovery success stories).
- Track It! Report progress annually using Re-TRAC.
a. Year One: Commit to at least a 5 percent increase in at least one of the three food diversion categories (prevention, donation, and composting) or alternatively, a combined 5 percent increase across all three food waste diversion categories. If partners have no data from a previous year for a category, they may select a site-specific goal.
b. Years Two and Three: Set site-specific numerical targets based on opportunities at your facility
Why Join?
- Improve your bottom line through cost savings from improved purchasing and preparation practices and reduced waste disposal fees
- Support your community by using food to feed people, not landfills
- Reduce your environmental footprint and greenhouse gas emissions
- Get recognized for your achievements with Food Recovery Challenge awards
- Access free technical assistance with your baseline assessment and undertaking food recovery
Why Food Waste Reduction and Recovery?
- In 2010, just under 35 million tons of food waste was generated. Of that, almost 34 million tons (97%) was thrown away into landfills or incinerators. When excess food, leftover food, and food scraps are disposed of in a landfill, they decompose and become a significant source of methane — an extremely potent greenhouse gas. Much of this “waste” is not waste at all, but actually safe, wholesome food that could potentially feed millions of Americans. In 2010, over 14% of households in the U.S. were food insecure. Excess food, leftovers and scraps that are not fit for consumption and donation can be used to feed the soil by recycling (composting) food waste into a nutrient rich soil amendment.
Visit the EPA Food Recovery site for more information on the importance of food recovery and what you can do about it.
