Group Challenge
Creative Ways to Share Food at Your Organization
“When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest.” –Leviticus 19:9
The bible encourages the idea of gleaning, a practice in which farmers left food that had fallen when harvesting so that people who were hungry could collect, or glean, what was left behind in order to be fed. In this spirit, below are some ideas for ways to redistribute food at your parish or on your campus. We hope you can use some of these ideas to create a plan for sharing food in the future when public health guidelines allow it.
Schools
- Start a food share table
Talk to an administrator or teacher about creating a food share space in the cafeteria where people can leave what they don’t plan to eat for others to take. At the end of the day, leftover food can be washed and reused the next day or donated to a local food hunger organization.
- Offer your food to friends and ask for their leftovers
It might feel awkward at first, but a kind, “Are you going to eat that?” is sometimes all you need to prevent food waste at your lunch table. Start a conversation with your friends about your goal to reduce food waste and share your untouched food.
Universities
- Promote the Share Meals app on campus
The free Share Meals app empowers college students to easily and instantaneously share extra food with each other, whether it’s an extra meal swipe or food from events and meetings. View a one-page summary of the program, and consider promoting it at your campus.
- Start a Food Recover Network chapter on your campus
Food Recovery Network is a national nonprofit that unites students at colleges and universities to fight food waste and hunger by recovering perishable food that would otherwise go to waste from their campus dining halls and donating it to those in need.
Parishes
- Share fish fry leftovers
Find out where the extra food from your local fish fry goes. If it is wasted, connect with a local organization that could use the food. Not sure how to get started? Use a program like Meal Connect, a project of Feeding America, to find a local partner. Note: The Good Samaritan Food Donation Act is a federal law that encourages food donation by providing liability protection to food donors and nonprofits that accept food donations.
General Tips
- Find a food recovery program in your area
Use this list of global organizations working to prevent food waste to get ideas about how you can work to eliminate food waste at your organization.
- Bring a container for leftovers
There is often uneaten food at many events. If you or someone you know would enjoy the leftovers, bring a container to save the food from being thrown away.