Food-share database to end supermarket waste: Stores boost links with charities to help the hungry

From Daily Mail - Supermarkets and sandwich chains could soon share surplus food with families struggling in the economic downturn.

Under a proposal backed by the Government, retailers would log details of products approaching the end of their shelf-life on a database.

Charities, who are increasingly working with families who cannot afford to feed themselves, would use the information to arrange pick-ups of food and other unsold products set aside during the week by stores.

Charities would then put together parcels or cook meals using the surplus food and distribute it to the needy.

Tackling food poverty: The scheme would help families who cannot afford to feed themselves as well as cutting down on food wastage

Britain has seen an explosion in demand for food banks and food parcels amid the biggest squeeze on living standards in 60 years. 

The Government is putting pressure on food giants to back the scheme, which is designed to both cut food waste and help those in need. ...

‘Charities and retailers are already working together to make great use of surplus food and I’m hosting the roundtable today to look at new ways to make the system work even better.’ 

FareShare collects surplus from the food and drink industry and redistributes it to around 700 charities including the Salvation Army and homeless shelters.The nation’s biggest stores, including Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s Morrisons, the Co-op, M&S and Boots, will take part. Charities FareShare and FoodCycle, which were set up to tackle food poverty, will also be present.

The charities it supplies are also increasingly working with families living in food poverty.

The group wants supermarkets to provide food at each of its 18 outlets which would be picked up on a rota basis by local charities.

FoodCycle has called for the creation of a database so that food can be shared more effectively. 

The charity uses professional kitchens to produce free meals in 14 locations across the country and is currently in partnership with Sainsbury’s and  Waitrose, as well as smaller grocers and markets. 

Other retailers have been reluctant to back its work because they are worried about being sued if people fall ill as a result of eating surplus food.

The charities are supporting the introduction of a so-called Good Samaritan law which exists in the US, and ensures firms providing food in good faith are exempt from legal action.

The British Retail Consortium said its members already give excess food to charities but said discussions on improving communication between charities and retailers will be held.

It said the scheme should apply to all food retailers and could involve sandwich chains.

It comes as Waitrose announced  a commitment to donate surplus food from all branches to charities by the end of this year.

In the future, making donations to charities will be its preferred option for any unsold food that is still fit for consumption.

Free food, sharing and caring

From The Observer: " There is an extraordinary sign on the outside of a well-tended West Yorkshire vegetable garden: "Help yourself.

In the same town this summer, people will be helping themselves to sweetcorn growing around the police station. Compost and watering cans seized in drug farm raids find use in the local gardens. And come the autumn a trip to see a local doctor will be a pick-your-own free-for-all as the health centre's grounds have been turned into orchards.

Grieving families who want a rose bush at the graveyard are encouraged to think productive – in one case leading to a remembrance garden of broccoli.

Meanwhile, commuters can snip fresh herbs from the beds and pots outside the railway station. It's all kept weeded by an army of local people who give up an hour or so on the occasional Sunday.

With 40 volunteer beekeepers just trained up, there will soon be honey for all. Anyone inspired to start their own vegetable patch can borrow a community tool library at the community-run allotments.

In the next village, things have been taken even further. The local community are attempting to take over a pub and have already taken over the cinema, the theatre and even the town hall.

In a fold of the wet hills of Yorkshire, the communities of Hebden Bridge and Todmorden are at the vanguard of a movement that is picking up momentum across a UK disillusioned with corporate business, government and cuts. It is neither hippy nor New Age, but is made up of ordinary people, old and young, from both affluent homes and social housing.

Call it a sharing revolution. "Community empowerment, social enterprise, co-operative, it has various titles, but it's quietly getting huge," said Mike Perry of the Plunkett Foundation, a thriving national organisation supporting such enterprises nationwide. "I don't think it's about the recession as such in financial terms; it's more that it's made people think about what's important to them.

"It starts with food, then it's taking over a shop that's closing. Then it's getting fired up about broadband and renewable energy, taking over infrastructure of their community. We're at the start of what could be a significant movement."

There are nine community-run pubs and 300 such shops in the UK, but those numbers look set to grow dramatically, not least because they show staggering resilience in tough times, but also as people power reacts against closures that fundamentally affect their lives. It may not create many jobs, but it does glue communities together and keeps money circulating locally.

And it's not just in the countryside; there are many web schemes across the UK where people can arrange to swap or give away items to others in their area. Tool libraries and bike sharing are growing. In London, Streetbank.com has begun organising people to share everything from a lawnmower to a DVD with others within a mile's radius. Some 3,000 people have signed up in its first few months. DIY retailer B&Q has a pilot scheme in Reading on tool sharing, to ease the environmental damage caused by millions of people buying power tools they may use only once or twice."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/may/06/lifestyle-communities-hebden-bridge-todmorden