January 30, 2011 Food waste is a big subject and one that has been getting some notice as of late – especially with the help of such writings of Jonathan Bloom. A nationwide ecumenical nonprofit ministry, the Society of St. Andrew, has focused on changing the growing tons of wasted food into fresh food made available to those in need. Calling upon volunteers, they go into fields to glean what the farmer has left behind.
“Food gets left in the field for all kinds of reasons. Two big ones are that mechanical harvesting misses a lot — and sometimes the crops aren’t pretty enough for supermarket shelves.
“The statistics are that 96 billion pounds of food are left — this is pre-consumer food — goes to waste in this country,” says Linda Tozer of theSociety of St. Andrew, an organization that coordinates farmers around the Southeast and out West.
And that food-waste estimate, from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is going up, not down.”
You’ll get an idea of how much food could go to waste, if not for volunteer gleaners – just watch the video:
Go to original post, via NPR.