The University of Arkansas Office for Sustainability and Razorback Recovery, a registered student organization, are promoting a mid-stream food recovery effort with Chartwells, the campus dining service provider.
Mid-stream food recovery efforts help fight against food waste and hunger by collecting perishable leftover foods from retail foodservice establishments and delivering them immediately to communities and people in need.
Razorback Recovery coordinates students on the U of A campus to recover surplus food from campus dining halls, then donates and distributes the goods to those individuals in need in an effort to defend hunger and regulate needless waste locally.
Razorback Recovery is a member of a national network focused on food recovery on college campuses. The national Food Recovery Network works to create food recovery programs on every college campus in the country.
“The incredible volume of food recovered through our partner universities is unbelievable, 211,000 pounds since September 2011,” said Cameron Caja, Razorback Recovery president.
After volunteers complete a training process, they are assigned to a single pickup location where they will then prepare the leftover food and deliver to distribution partners. As food is collected and distributed, food safety is a primary concern.
“We take extreme precautions to ensure that food safety is the highest priority in everything we do. Training our members in proper food handling, packaging, and transport is our very first step,” said Caja.
“By diverting food waste from landfills, we can not only help our environment broadly, but also individual families specifically,” he said.
Razorback Recovery’s special guest, Ben Simon, founder and executive director of the national Food Recovery Network, spoke Tuesday, Nov. 12 at the U of A Food Justice Summit, a three-day conference highlighting social justice in food systems. Simon also met with students across campus throughout the week, promoting food recovery concepts. Details on the Meet and Greet with Ben Simon are available at https://www.facebook.com/events/477491889032241/
Simon is a senior at the University of Maryland, College Park, studying government and politics and nonprofit management. He has five years of nonprofit experience and is a long-time advocate of food justice. ABC News and Univision recognized Simon as one of their Top 10 Social Entrepreneurs in 2012.
The Associated Student Government, Residential Interhall Congress, the U of A Applied Sustainability Center and the Volunteer Action Center all joined together to bring Simon to campus this week.
Razorback Recovery will hold a meeting tonight, Wednesday, at 5:30 p.m. in the Holcombe Hall living room. The meeting is open to any students or club members interested in participating in campus food recovery efforts.
Carlos Ochoa, director of the U of A Office for Sustainability, which provides support for campus sustainability programs, said Razorback Recovery provides unique opportunities for students to get involved in important food- and hunger-related issues on campus.
“The group provides much-needed waste diversion, which helps the University inch closer to our goal of Zero Waste and Carbon Neutrality. They also provide a niche for those who suffer from food insecurity in Washington County, where one in four people do not know how to access their next meal. Razorback Recovery provides both an educational opportunity as well as an opportunity for students to actually do something meaningful on their campus,” said Ochoa.
For more information, contact Razorback Recovery through the Volunteer Action Center or GoSpareTime.com. For further information about the Food Recovery Network visit http://www.foodrecoverynetwork.org/about-us/
