Food Waste Intelligence

Chef Ann Cooper, Director of Nutrition Services for Boulder Valley School District, in Colorado, USA, and founder of the Chef Ann Foundation has worked with Leanpath to reduce food waste across the district. We also recently collaborated on a new curriculum teaching the importance of food waste prevention to elementary school students.

Staff engagement in food waste prevention pays big dividends. When staff are engaged in tracking food waste, a kitchen gets more complete data, which provides greater insight into what a kitchen is wasting and why. But staff engagement in a mission-driven effort like food waste prevention also leads to better retention and job satisfaction.

We’ve just returned from ReFED’s 2019 Food Waste Summit in San Francisco, where we were excited to participate with many long-time partners and colleagues on the challenge of advancing food waste reduction at scale in accordance with Target 12.3 of the Sustainable Development Goals - which calls for cutting global food waste in half by 2030.

The Hilton San Diego Bayfront, a 1,190-room luxury hotel on the city’s waterfront, has been tracking food waste with Leanpath for only five months, but has already seen a dramatic reduction in food waste: a 50% drop in waste by weight and 51% drop by waste value.

Today is World Food Day – a day that we take to heart at Leanpath. Coming on the heels of Climate Week in New York City, where we spent several days engaged in energizing sessions on how to positively change the global food system with numerous partners and thought leaders from organizations such as the World Resources Institute and Champions 12.3, The Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition (BCFN), and the Future Food Institute, we’re even more energized by the importance of this day.