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“Every year in America, we throw away 96 billion pounds of food” Dive! A film by Jeremy Seifert
"... and eat and drink, but be not excessive. Indeed, He (God) likes not those who commit excess" (Quran: Al Araf, 7:31)
Average boxcar of a train can hold 211,000 of cargo. If you fill each to its capacity you will fill more than 450,000 box cars. That is a train long enough to stretch from Los Angeles to New York and all the way back. Wasting 96 billion pounds of food costs roughly $136 billion annually.
What we throw out reveals a lot about our society. Our grand parents lived with the virtue of “waste not and want not”
Just so you know in our community, the young population under 30 years of age has complete lack of understanding about the food. They don t know when the food has gone bad and when it's fine to eat
Food makes about 20% of landfill. That means we are feeding our landfill as much as our country. Food in landfill produces harmful methane gas.
“After cars, food system uses more fossil fuel than any other sector of the economy - 19%
New York Times “Farmer in Chief”, Michael Pollan
USDA estimates food stamp enrollment will grow to over 40 million Americans in 2010 at a cost of up to $59 billion
The kind of society that wastes that much food is the one that does not value the earth and what it produces. Is this another product for us to consume?
UK household throw out 18 billion pounds of food every year. The serving portion can be small and people can clean the plates after they done eating. EU wastes around 200 billion pound of food every year
It takes seven lb of corn and 2,500 gallons of water to produce one lb of meat. 40% of world annual grain yield is fed to animals to produce meat
Food waste happens at all levels; In farms, transportation, in packaging, in grocery stores, in restaurants and in our homes
35 million Americans don t know where their next meal is coming from. Of that 11 million Americans are actually going hungry. They are not going to eat for a day or two. Simple as that
Ironically, the advances in reducing the food waste and increasing the production through new food science, efficient packaging, and distribution was the foundation for modern agribusiness, the broken food system that now wastes one half of all it produces
“Just because one egg was cracked, grocery stores throw away pack of perfectly good eggs. Then they lock the dumpster area to make sure the food goes in total waste. Why this good food is thrown out and not given to people who need it?”
“In just a week of retrieving good food from one Traders Joe’s dumpster, one family can store a supply of meat in freezer for entire year. Freezing food time locks the expiration date of dairy and meat products”
We are going to have to ask you to leave because you can t be asking questions. He wrote letter to CEO of the Traders Joe’s. Traders Joe’s is best for dumpster diving. We picked up lots of good food from their dumpster
“I don t understand why they get upset for stealing trash. How it could be criminal in anyway? I would be proud to get caught stealing waste. When police comes, I shake their hand explain to them what I am doing. Yes, it’s trespassing and against the law. It’s a conflict between what is just and what is legal”
“Traders Joe managers won t talk on or off camera. They asked us to talk to the head quarter. Vons won t talk, their policy; no interviews. Ralf refused to interview. They gave us the card to talk to the "right" people. More stores I visited, more silence and resistance I received” Jeremy Seifert
Anything that is dated the next day is most likely to end up in dumpster. The best buy or best use date is for caution only. It does not mean that food is not edible after expiration date. They do that to protect them from possible lawsuits
Batch of avocados. One goes bad, they throw away whole bag. Apple, oranges. They are tossing it for no good reason.
Los Angeles food banks are short 11 million pound of food. LA county throws away 24 billion pound of trash. According to EPA, 12% of that is food. That means county throws away almost 3 billion pound of food every year. Even 1% of that will be 3 times more than what is needed to cut the food bank shortage to zero
One in seven households in the US are living with hunger or are at risk of hunger. US Dept of Agriculture
US has the greatest food surplus of any nation, 200% of the energy requirements of its population. WASTE, By Tristram Stuart
222 pounds of meat per person per year in US is way over (their limit), we far exceed what is healthy and sustainable for the planet
In Haiti people eat mud cakes mixed with salt, vegetables and filthy water. A good contrast of our excess and their lack. Six million people in Ethiopia are at risk of acute hunger
The Good Samaritan Act of 1996 signed by president Bill Clinton encourages grocery stores to donate food and protects them from being sued at the same time
Nearly half of all US children and 90% of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during their childhood
Associated Press, Lindsey Tanner
After sending letters for two weeks, I got call from Traders Joe headquarters. Alison from public relations asked me to stop sending letters. They would not be discussing wastage of food with me. When I insisted on simple conversation with no camera or interview, he hung up. They say it's the logistics that forces them to throw away the food. So it requires volunteers to pick up the food and deliver to the hungry
Finally, one Traders Joe’s gave us six grocery carts full of food. If I had not called them today it would have been in dumpster tonight. Not all traders Joe’s stores have time to give away food.
Some will back down at the last minutes For example, Whole Food. Working with individual stores have been much better than working with their headquarter
The non-profit organization, God Provides, picks up food from four Los Angeles Traders Joe’s stores and Albertsons
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“Every year in America, we throw away 96 billion pounds of food”
“After cars, food system uses more fossil fuel than any other sector of the economy - 19% New York Times “Farmer in Chief”, Michael Pollan
“It takes seven lb of corn and 2,500 gallons of water to produce one lb of meat. 40% of world annual grain yield is fed to animals to produce meat”
222 pounds of meat per person per year in US is way over (their limit), we far exceed what is healthy and sustainable for the planet
“They say it's the logistics that forces them to throw away the food. So it requires volunteers to pick up the food and deliver to the hungries”
One in seven households in the US are living with hunger or are at risk of hunger. US Dept of Agriculture
“Just because one egg was cracked, grocery stores throw away pack of perfectly good eggs.” Dive! A film by Jeremy Seifert
The Good Samaritan Act of 1996 signed by president Bill Clinton encourages grocery stores to donate food and protects them from being sued at the same time “Batch of avocados. One goes bad, they throw away whole bag. Apple, oranges. They are tossing it for no good reason”
“Nearly half of all US children and 90% of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during their childhood” Associated Press, Lindsey Tanner
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