Hunger Abound

There has been a 21% jump in food bank usage in Manitoba alone 2010. Winnipeg Harvest is now feeding 48,000 people in the city and another 10,000 outside city limits. Food bank and soup kitchen usage is increasing drastically everywhere throughout North America and Europe. Food banks are finding it difficult to keep their shelves stocked. Increasingly that means salvaging food that would otherwise go to waste is taking on more urgency as federal food aid programs face deep cuts. All throughout the food chain there is a winnowing process where anything that doesn't look quite right or isn't the right size gets cast away. This squadering of perfectly good food happens from farm to fork. Elimination of food waste could lift 1 billion people out of hunger. One of the best methods to reduce waste is to educate the public as to this terrible problem as well as how to not waste food.

Governments are working on the problem by raising consumer awareness and reducing waste to landfills, getting surplus to those who need it, proven storage and processing. Extending sustainability of crop. Some good ideas by the UN food;
Working to create local food partnerships to harness local government, health authorities, community groups and local business to meet local sustainability goals
Increase efforts to reduce food waste, planning for zero food waste to landfill by 2015
Ensure practical food experience in schools including cooking skills and food growing
Reflect the cost of ensuring a nutritious and sustainable diet in minimum wage and benefit levels
Mandate health and sustainability standards for all publicly procured food.
Enable the meat and dairy industry to reduce its reliance on grain feedstuffs to lower land use and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (10 kg of grain to produce 1 kg of meat)
Reduce subsidies to large corporate farms and mono-cropping who receive most of the subsidies. Particular crops such as corn, wheat, and cotton receive disproportionate relative to other more nutritious vegetables.
Manufacturers and producers need to be encouraged to be more efficient and frugal, to not overproduce.
Supermarkets encouraged to sell some less than perfect produce, reduced prices on damaged or close to sell by date goods, get rid of BOGO, and reduce packaging by making stuff available in more sizes.
Encourage all companies to donate excess food.
Make stock speculation on food stuffs illegal.

One of the latest innovation is taking the dented and crushed cans from stores that would be normally all be tossed. They were tossed because nobody knew if bacteria had managed to slip through small cracks and spoil the food. That may soon change. They are testing a new system that uses a machine that creates a vacuum seal. They place several damaged cans inside and remove all of the air, causing the cans to puff up. After the pressure is released they inspect the cans for any leakage. If there were an holes or cracks for bacteria to enter some of food would have leaked out. This technology mean tons of additional food for each food bank. So far it is proving to be rather successful, one example was a test of 300 cans which saw only one that was a bad. Demand keeps growing and they are always looking for untapped sources. They get lots of donations from local grocery stores and retailers but also have their eye on those that don't give yet. Hospitals, hotels, re caterers, restaurants. Restaurants have prepared food that they could give that hasn't been utilized, still in the kitchen leftover. The challenge is trying to convince potential donors that it is a good idea to donate and then trying to find a way to store and transport donations safely.

Farms are also a promising source for more donations. In the US alone 6 billion pounds of produce never leaves the farm. It routinely gets plowled under if the market is not their. This A national organization of food banks is working to try to get 1 billion pounds of this produce directly to the poor. It is the kind of healthy food that the poor require, but it is also highly perishable.

Another effort to change food loss is underway, a new venture between the North American food bank network and big companies like Wal-Mart and Safeway. A lot of the food waste is from food sitting on store shelves going bad. Food banks are trying to get these groceries to feed the hungry. The big challenge is time, transferring the food to people who need it before it spoils. Tens of millions people need help getting enough to eat, they have to choose between food or electricity and house payments. Getting the food they need is a big logistical challenge that food banks are increasingly facing as the numbers of the hungry increase. The journey the food takes to the hungry regularly starts two days earlier. 48 hours earlier inside stores some of the food items are nearing their sell by dates. Store workers will begin to start pulling them off the shelf and setting them aside. It starts in the meat department where they set aside packages that say to use or freeze by today. They place them in a box for donation and place them in the freezer. Along with dairy products, two day old bread and baked goods. Early the next morning they check the produce for anything with brown spots, blemishes or a little bit dry and place it aside. Customers have an expectation for perfect looking produce at its peak. Not long ago many stores would have thrown this food away or recycled it for compost or animal feed. Even though it is still all good for human consumption. In the late morning the food bank truck arrives, usually three times a week. A normal take is roughly two dozen boxes, around 100 pounds of meat and over 300 pounds of produce. After collecting some other donations the truck arrives at the food bank at noon. The donations are sorted, the meat goes right into the freezer and the dry and canned goods are inspected for anything that is leaking or bad. The produce ends up in a large walk in cooler with the dairy products. The next challenge is to get all the perishables out the door fast well they are still good. Workers from agencies they supply, such as the Salvation Army, who were contacted to collect some fresh food arrive around an hour later. The agencies collect enough to last them a day or at least too meals. They can get around six cases of food for under $10. Three hours later the Salvation Army and the other agencies prepare to serve their clients, by five o'clock the dining room is filled with mostly homeless who are given plates piled high. between 24 and 11 hours since being taken off the shelves. Early the second morning the food bank loads remaining goods into their mobile pantry vehicle and head out to deliver to those unable to get to the food bank or soup kitchens. Going to different locations such as parking lots with lineups of around 50 people, most elderly and poor on fixed incomes. Some of these people have run out of money and didn't have any more to drink or eat. By that afternoon they are eating food taken off the shelves only 48 hours earlier. Regular customers coming to the food bank the entire three days and continually. The next day the food banks once again heads to the big stores and to collect more food.

It is becoming tricky to safely transport all of this fresh and frozen. Food banks are increasingly in the market for more refrigerated and pantry trucks to get food quickly and safely to those the who need it. Wal-Mart for example has given food banks 100 refrigerated trucks