Food Waste Intelligence

As awareness of the connection between food waste and climate change grows globally, a new report illustrates the environmental impact of China’s food waste in stark detail. More than a quarter of food produced for human consumption in China is lost or wasted each year. The carbon footprint of that waste is equal to the entire emissions of a country the size of the United Kingdom.

Earth Day is April 22. There’s never a wrong time to talk about the impact of food waste prevention on the environment, but Earth Day seems particularly well suited. Each day in the seven days leading up to Earth Day? Even better. If your organization is committed to food waste prevention, we encourage you to remind your team of the critical work they are doing to address some of the world’s greatest sustainability challenges. Beginning April 15—one week before Earth Day—incorporate one reason why food waste prevention matters a day i...

As soon as the COVID-19 pandemic reached the U.S., Vidant Medical Center in eastern North Carolina began to prepare for the potential of overcrowding, supply chain interruptions, and overwhelming strain on the staff. To support the patients and staff, Vidant’s dining services team jumped in to adapt their operations. “Our customer base dropped dramatically almost overnight,” said Troy Sheppard, Food & Nutrition Service Line Administrator and Client Executive with Sodexo, which provides dining operations for Vidant Health system. Incre...

An ambitious new resource to help understand the problem of food waste in the United States ranked food waste tracking as the most financially impactful solution foodservice organizations can leverage. Launched by the nonprofit ReFED, the new Insights Engine builds on the group’s landmark 2016 study, A Roadmap to Reduce U.S. Food Waste by 20%. Like in that earlier report, preventing food waste (which food waste tracking enables) remains the focus of the Insights Engine.

Mount Holyoke College started tracking food waste with Leanpath in October of 2019. And then, well, the world changed. For the safety of the community the majority of the students were asked to leave in the spring. The college reopened in August with only 150 students on campus. The private women’s college in Massachusetts, USA, typically has a student body of 2,200. “But the college wanted to make sure those students got a great dining program, and they also wanted to keep as many of our foodservice staff employed as possible,” expla...