Progress report for FLW24-011
Project Information
At a time when 12.8% of households in the United States are experiencing food insecurity, between 30 and 40 percent of the food supply is wasted. This translates into approximately 133 billion pounds of food that is wasted each year in the United States [1]. Food insecurity is particularly prevalent in Kentucky with 1 in 6 people and 1 in 5 children experiencing food insecurity [2]. In Kentucky, it is estimated that in 2017 over 40 million tons of food waste was generated with only 6% of that waste diverted away from landfills and incinerators [3]. Therefore, to reduce FLW while providing food to those experiencing food and nutrition insecurity, a necessary first step is to identify where FLW is occurring within a network of community feeding programs in Kentucky from the level of gleaning to the point of food distribution to food insecure individuals. To our knowledge, providing FLW training and education to those handling donated foods is not a common practice, but is necessary [4]. Moreover, just as providing surplus food simultaneously relieves food insecurity and reduces FLW, implementing positive dietary behaviors concurrently fosters individual FLW reduction behaviors.
The purpose of The Waste Not, Want Not- Kentucky Feeding Network (WiN- WiN) project is to 1) increase the recovery of surplus foods from Kentucky farms and food producers to divergent models of community-feeding program outlets, 2) assess food loss and waste (FLW) occurring upon delivery of surplus foods to community-feeding program outlets and during their distribution to program recipients, 3) develop and implement training and education materials for stakeholders involved in gleaning, feeding and consuming farm fresh foods using our community-informed FLW reduction and feeding best practices tool kit, and 4) disseminate our training and education materials to various organizations throughout Kentucky and beyond to reduce FLW. The WiN- WiN project operates at the level of donation, a highly preferred strategy listed in the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Wasted Food Scale [5]. The WiN-WiN project is grounded in the Social Ecologic Model [6] and will use a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach [7, 8]. Partners include community-feeding programs (Whole Food Distributor, Meal Provider, and individual Meal Preparers), farmers and food producers, and a statewide gleaning organization. We are purposefully including three different, but common types of community programs to receive surplus foods in order to foster expansion of WiN-WiN into other communities. How these programs use and provide surplus foods to individuals varies, but there are shared points critical to reducing FLW across these feeding chains. These differences in food use and provision create numerous opportunities to generate FLW reduction and nutrition education training materials for the providers and feeding program recipients. If funded, this proposal's outcomes will allow for the development and implementation of outreach materials that promote FLW reduction methods along critical points from recovery to distribution within three common community-feeding program models that are transferable to other community-feeding programs located in other Kentucky counties and beyond.
The aims of the proposed WiN-WiN project are to initiate and implement a gleaning network between farms, food producers and community-feeding programs in Jessamine County, Kentucky; establish a FLW tracking system; assess FLW occurring upon delivery of farm fresh surplus foods to community-feeding program outlets; assess FLW occurring during their distribution to program recipients; use our findings to develop FLW reduction and nutrition training and education materials for distribution to stakeholders involved in gleaning, feeding and consuming foods; and then disseminate our community-informed FLW reduction and feeding best practices tool kit across Kentucky and nationally.
1.Establish a network of FLW reduction and feeding program partners, FLW and feeding best practices tool kit, and FLW tracking system by the end of year 1:
a. Establish a tool kit of FLW reduction and feeding best practices that uses our well-established Campus Kitchen program at the University of Kentucky (CKUK) as a model of FLW reduction and feeding.
b. Build capacity to divert farm food items by increasing from 0 to at least 3, contracts between Glean Kentucky and surplus food donators in our pilot county (Jessamine County, Kentucky).
c. Increase the number of feeding programs working with Glean Kentucky (and Kentucky farmers) in Jessamine County, to 4 programs.
-
-
- Recipient organizations to include at least 1 program that provides whole farm food items to recipients; 1 organization that provides meals made with Kentucky farm ingredients to recipients; and 1 organization providing Kentucky farm food items, meal preparation and cooking education to recipients.
-
d. Develop a tracking system that can be centrally used across community partners that captures required grant metrics.
-
-
- Weight of donated food received from Glean Kentucky (amount of food diverted in pounds by city and zip code of origin); the weight of donated foods being wasted due to the foods being spoiled or not fit for human consumption; report the composition of foods being diverted; and the amount of food wasted during distribution to individuals.
-
2. Train community partners and learn best practices from community partners by the end of year 2:
a. Increase the number of feeding programs working with Glean Kentucky (and Kentucky farmers) in Jessamine County, from 4 to at least 6 programs.
b. Community partners will be trained to use our tracking system to capture required grant metrics.
c. Begin training community partner feeding organizations with our initial Campus Kitchen-informed FLW reduction and feeding program best practices tool kit.
d. Expand the FLW reduction and feeding best practices tool kit by incorporating feedback from community partner organizations.
e. Begin offering nutrition-related education and training that aligns with FLW reduction strategies to community organizations based on feasibility and needs of community feeding programs.
3. Adapt and disseminate FLW reduction and feeding program training tools by the end of year 3:
a. Finalize the community-informed FLW reduction and feeding best practices tool kit. Develop at minimum 3 FLW reduction and feeding program resources based on our best practices tool kit to include a manual and potentially develop presentations, workshops, training videos, guidance documents, other online resources, and scholarly and academic articles.
b. Disseminate FLW training and outreach materials to at least 5 different audiences to build capacity in other locations and venues to reduce food loss and waste.
c. Identify and build capacity in a contiguous county, located in the Central Kentucky Extension Region, by establishing a community advisory board to work towards developing a FLW reduction and feeding program network that utilizes our best practices tool kit.
Cooperators
Research
Our primary method for reducing food loss and waste (FLW) is through gleaning surplus produce from home growers and farms. Secondary is through providing outreach and education pertaining to nutrition and food handling best practices along critical points of the feeding chain from food collection to consumption.
Since grant initiation we have primarily focused on Objective 1. Once we discovered that in Jessamine County there are few farmers with excess produce we switched our efforts to recruiting home growers to provide their surplus produce. The past few months have been spent building community relationships while identifying strategically located organizations that have the capacity to serve as a community drop-off site for community members to bring their excess food during the farmers market season. As we have identified drop-off sites we have been working with them to establish food drop-off days and times, as well as having initial brainstorming conversations of the drop-off logistics for each site. Much planning and discussion went into choosing drop-off sites throughout the county that are familiar, willing, and accessible to community members. Literature shows that providing convenient hours for donations is important for success. Therefore, we are striving for convenience by offering a combination of weekday hours that are within and outside of a typical workday, as well as a mid-morning/early afternoon Saturday option. In choosing the drop-off days we also had to consider when community feeding programs were available to receive the donated produce. Additionally, we are partnering with the two farmers markets in Jessamine County. Each market is allowing us to leave crates at the market for farmers to donate any produce that they do not want to haul home with them.
We are also working to secure individuals to become Glean Kentucky volunteers that will collect food from the drop-off sites, as well as the farmers markets, and any recruited farms that will then bring the food to our community feeding programs. Glean Kentucky will add our community drop-off sites to their database by essentially treating them as they would treat farmer donors. We have five drop-off sites identified and the two farmers markets (objective 1b). Three of the drop-off sites are also our community feeding programs that will receive the donated food. We have a total of five partner community feeding programs that will use the produce to feed individuals experiencing food and nutrition insecurity (obj 1c and obj 2a).
We held zoom interviews with community feeding program directors to collect information about produce preferences, if they would be open to receiving recipes if unfamiliar foods are delivered, how many people they serve in a given time, and what day and time can they receive produce deliveries, and current challenges with receiving, storing, using food. SARE table_summary of partners and produce needs
The following tools are being reviewed by our community advisory board and will experience editorial changes, but these will be used during the spring, summer and fall to collect information. As the project evolves the number of evaluation tools will increase. The evaluation tools will continue to be developed to generate outcome data aligned with our program objectives.
1.Food recipient organizations Qualtrics survey (Recipient Survey) - this survey is serving as our tracking system that will be used across community partners that captures the required grant FLW metrics. Our community partners are in the process of testing the survey and providing feedback.
2.Drop-off site log sheet (Donation Sign-in Sheet)- the donor fills in the sign-in sheet. The sign-in sheet asks donors to record the weight of their donation, list what they donated, how they heard of the WiN-WiN program, and to list their contact information so that we can send them program updates and FLW reduction tips. This serves as a backup for collecting the amount and type of food donated.
3.Glean Kentucky volunteer data collection tool (Glean KY Database Fields): Glean Volunteers are required to enter information about their gleaning trip that includes the weight and type of food gleaned from food producers and location. This also serves as a backup for collecting the zip code, amount and type of food donated.
4.We have discussed the vision of our tool kit with our Campus Kitchen at the University of Kentucky (CKUK) colleagues and a local food rescue organization, Food Chain. We also observed the operations of Food Chain as they gleaned food from Trader Joe’s grocery store. From these interactions we drafted an outline of the tool kit (obj 1a). Our CKUK colleagues provided feedback on our toolkit outline. We will continue to make adjustments to this draft outline, but early in the second grant quarter we will have it reviewed by community partners (Tool Kit Outline). We will conduct semi-structured interviews with appropriate individuals within our community partner organizations that can provide us feedback on the content and order of the toolkit as well as the format of the outreach and educational tools that would best support learning of content. Before the interviews, we will give them a copy of the outline along with prompts of points to consider while they review the outline, which will aid our interview discussions. Their feedback will be collated and considered, and adjustments to the outline will be made before fleshing out the sections of the tool kit.
- Farm
- Distribution
- Storage
- School/institution
- Home
- Prevent Wasted Food
- Donate or Upcycle
Our food recovery methods includes prevent wasted food and donate/upcycle. With WiN-WiN in its inaugural launch year we have not recovered food to-date. But our project activities thus far are establishing the logistics of the WiN-WiN program to prevent food from being wasted throughout the county by establishing drop-off sites for growers to bring their excess produce, and recruiting home growers and farms to donate their surplus to our WiN-WiN program. The surplus will provide our 5 feeding community partner organizations with the surplus food. Our website explains our program.
We do not have outcome results at this time, but we do have process results. We have five drop-off sites identified for community growers to bring surplus produce and two farmers markets that will collect any excess produce from their vendors each week. (objective 1b). Three of the drop-off sites are also our community feeding programs that will provide the donated food to feed individuals experiencing food and nutrition insecurity. We have a total of five partner community feeding programs that will provide the produce to underserved populations.
An unexpected result was discovering that farmers in Jessamine County typically do not have surplus food to donate. Therefore, acting on advice from our community advisory board we are working on recruiting home gardeners to donate their excess to produce to the WiN-WiN program. We are working with Glean Kentucky to incorporate our drop-off sites into their database so that volunteers can transport produce to feeding organizations as needed. We anticipate that this home gardener model will be desirable in other Kentucky counties that have farmers with little food surplus. We are also making note of our county-wide marketing campaign to make home gardeners and farmers aware of our program in order to share these methods with other counties. Through our marketing campaign we are hopeful that we will identify 3 farmers to partner with Glean Kentucky (Obj 1b).
The donated food will be provided to community feeding organizations that interact with individuals with food and nutrition insecurity. Some of the programs differ in how they provide food to people. The "meal preparers" provide meals, "whole food distributor" provides whole foods, and "meal preparer" are individuals within the organization that prepare meals for themselves. Our team includes registered dietitians and we will provide nutrition education with a lens of FLW reduction. We plan to capture the amount of recovered food from each organization once the program officially launches in April. Therefore, I listed 1 pound as the amount of food diverted because we do not have that current data.
|
Name of Community Organization |
|
Manna Meals- Nicholasville United Methodist Church (Meal Provider)
|
|
Kentucky United Methodist Children’s Homes-Safe Haven Independent Living Program (Meal Preparer)
|
|
Revive Life House Drug and Alcohol Addiction Recovery Center for Men (Meal Provider and Meal Preparer)
|
|
|
|
Jessamine County Food Pantry (Whole Food Distributer) |
|
Family Food Center Food Bank at Bethel Harvest Church (Whole Food Distributer) |
- Produce
The WiN-WiN program has not been launched to-date. Therefore, we do not have food waste type or percentages yet, but we anticipate that produce will primarily be donated, but our community feeding organizations and donation drop-off sites are open to receiving foods aside from fresh produce.
We have had discussions with 17 food producers (primarily farmers) to ask about their interest in participating in this program. Of these, only one farmer had heard of Glean Kentucky and none were aware of the Food Connection at the University of Kentucky. We shared background information and contact information about each organization with all of the food producers. We do have 3 farmers at this time to follow up with in the early summer to ask if they want to partner with Glean KY to support our program. In addition, we were able to establish relationships with the 2 farmers market managers who represent the only two farmers markets in Jessamine county, the Wilmore and Nicholasville farmers markets. They are willing to have crates at their markets in which the vendors can donate any surplus they have to the program rather than hauling it home. The markets also agreed to market the WiN-WiN program by displaying our flyers.
Another unique partner that we came upon through this work is the Asbury University Community Garden program. They are willing to donate any surplus produce to our drop-off sites and we are in conversations with them of how to incorporate FLW reduction education into their program. The courses we have in mind are courses BIO 121 (1 CH)/122 (1 CH) Mission Farm I and II. In BIO 121 students partake in an introductory experiential study of the process of establishing and running a sustainable farm. Knowledge about food production and how it can be used to begin and foster relationships especially in the context of mission will be presented. Students will acquire skills needed to plan, establish, maintain and harvest a garden. There will be an emphasis on transferability of this knowledge to other cultures, especially on the mission field. BIO 122: It is a continuation of BIO 121. More advanced topics in sustainability are discussed in the context of developing the farm and small livestock husbandry is covered.
The following are milestones that we listed within WiN-WiN program timeline to start in quarters 1 and 2 of Year 1. We have started all of these and are on track with our timeline thus far.
Collaboration with SARE FLW Program Manager and other awardees - we have participated on the USDA grantee webinars and have joined and participated in the Association of Gleaning Organizations' monthly coffee chats and are in the process of registering for the online April 2025 symposium.
IRB approval- procedures for the initial processes of WiN-WiN were deemed by UK's IRB to not require IRB approval. The procedures included reaching out to community feeding program directors to get their initial thoughts on nutrition services they would like provided, produce preferences, delivery day/time preferences, and storage capacity; and collecting feedback on the food waste tracking qualtrics survey. We are working on gaining IRB approval for collection of outcome evaluation indicators.
Hire a program manager- Lauren Batey MS, RDN was hired as the program manager January 1, 2025.
Expand Glean Kentucky’s network of food producers and feeding organizations to meet objectives-- we have identified five community feeding organizations that will receive donated food from Glean Kentucky. Glean KY is in the process of adding these organizations to their database. We have also established five community drop-off sites for independent growers to bring their garden surplus (Obj 1b). The three drop-off sites that are not associated with a feeding organization (Fitch's IGA, St. Luke Catholic Church, famers market (Nicholasville and Wilmore)) have been added to Glean Kentucky's database as a gleaning location. We are planning to reach out to 3 farmers in June who showed potential interest in partnering with Glean KY and the WiN-WiN program.
Establish first version of FLW reduction tool kit- we started a draft outline of the tool kit. With the help of UK Campus Kitchen we will continue to flesh it out and then have our community feeding partners review the outline and collect feedback about formatting of education and outreach tools.
Develop initial FLW tracking system with input from Community Advisory Board- we have done this and received feedback from Co-Is. Now that our drop-off sites have been established and they are being added to Glean KY database we plan to explain the qualtrics survey and collect feedback from community feeding program staff that will be using the survey.
Process evaluation- we will document the steps and training involved with setting up the drop-off sites (this is what the SNEB poster will capture); collect tool kit outline feedback, and FLW tracking system feedback in the next quarter. More process and outcome evaluation methods and collection will be added as the project unfolds.
Education
WiN-WiN is in the inaugural year of its launch. With this being a new initiative along with having to switch our model from not only recruiting farmers, but community growers as well, at this time our education materials primarily focus on food donation and collection procedures. As the program evolves our education materials will move beyond making people aware of the WiN-WiN program and donation/collection procedures at drop-off sites. Future education material will start with addressing FLW reduction at the point of transporting and delivering donated foods to community feeding programs. We plan to develop FLW education materials that address critical points along the path from collection to consumption. Community-based Participatory Research informs our educational tools. We have had members of our community advisory board review our materials that we have developed thus far and plan to continue that approach for the future.
In April, we plan to meet with each drop-off site to set up the materials needed for them to receive and transfer collected produce to a volunteer who will transport the donated food to a community feeding program. Additionally, after collecting feedback from partners and adjusting our Qualtrics food waste tracking survey, we will provide our community feeding organizations with instructions of how and when to use our Qualtrics survey.
Also in April, the following materials will be developed and posted on the WiN-WiN website and we will ask our drop-off sites to post on our drop-off site social media outlets. The purpose is to teach people how to donate, collect, store, and transport food safely and in a manner that maximizes the shelf life of the food.
1) for each food collection drop-off site, we will provide videos demonstrating how to drop food off.
2) for each food collection drop-off site, we will develop simple and concise written instructions to post at each site that explains how to drop food off.
3) provide a handout to post on the website that targets food donors that explains “ugly” produce and inedible for human consumption. Essentially, standards for the donated food.
4) develop a video and written instructions that explain volunteer responsibilities and how volunteers can sign-up as a Glean Kentucky volunteer that will transport food from the drop-off sites to community feeding program recipients.
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation Summary:
The consultations that we provided with our drop-off sites and community feeding program partners will ultimately improve the quality of life for communities because our consultations consider the uniqueness of each location by logistically laying the groundwork at each drop-off site and community feeding organization to reduce FLW and improve food and nutrition security among individuals. Currently, our consultations have included site visits to look at space and brainstorm with partners the equipment needed to maximize their assets to allow for safe collection, storage, transportation, and utilization of the donated food. We have talked with many food producers and explained how Glean KY and WiN-WiN are working together to reduce FLW and improve food and nutrition security.
Thus far, the substance use recovery center community feeding program has been found to need the most help with organizing their space and standardizing their food service operations to support food safety and FLW reduction. Our initial consultations and superficial observations have identified that with each community feeding partner there are places where we can provide education to promote FLW. Over the next few months we will do a deeper dive with our observations to determine where FLW is occurring.
Curricula, factsheets or educational tools – at this time we have developed materials to raise awareness in the community of how people can help the hungry in their community by donating their excess garden or farm produce (Donation Flyer, Farmer Flyer), volunteering to help transport the collected produce from drop-off sites/farmers markets to a community feeding organization (Volunteer Flyer). As mentioned above we have developed a draft outline of our tool kit that needs to be reviewed by our community partners. The tool kit outline includes content ranging from explaining why reducing FLW is important to providing methods to reduce FLW along the food chain from donation to consumption (Tool Kit Outline). Ad hoc educational materials on a variety of topics related to reducing FLW will be created to be provided for partners, community members, and made available on our website. Examples include Food labels.
Number unique items created- To support community education and engagement, we have developed and maintained multiple digital platforms to expand community awareness and education efforts. Our WiN-WiN website (https://winwin.ca.uky.edu/) provides a central hub of information for donors, volunteers, and partner organizations, including details about donation logistics, volunteer opportunities, resources, and strategies to reduce food waste. Sections for recipes using local produce and waste-free meal planning are under development. The site is regularly updated and designed to be accessible and informative for a wide audience. We also develop and share weekly educational tips through our WiN-WiN Facebook and Instagram pages. We will continue covering topics like produce donation guidelines, recipes, food storage tips, and simple ideas for reducing waste at home. These posts are original content created specifically for the program to keep the community engaged and informed throughout the growing season. Together, these tools provide ongoing education that is accessible, locally relevant, and focused on building a culture of food recovery and waste reduction across Jessamine County.
Webinars, talks and presentations
Oral presentation. Southern Region Extension and Research (SERA) 47 Annual Meeting December 2024- Developing Partnerships to Work Towards Meeting Objectives of the Waste Not, Want Not (WiN-WiN) Kentucky Feeding Network Program
Poster presentation. Society for Nutrition Education and Behavior Conference, July 2025. Using a Local Food Systems Approach to Reduce Food Loss and Waste through the Waste Not, Want Not (WiN-WiN) Kentucky Feeding Network. Abstract submitted.
Poster presentation. Food & Nutrition Conference & Expo, October 2025. Maximizing Meals, Minimizing Waste through Foodservice Optimization with the Waste Not, Want Not (WiN-WiN) Kentucky Feeding Network Program. Late breaking abstract to be submitted May 2025.
Other Educational Activities- as part of our WiN-WiN awareness campaign we are offering organizations, such as places of worship, a WiN-WiN team member to explain the purpose of the WiN-WiN program to their audience. We have two upcoming events, but anticipate more requests. A team member will speak at the Masses being held at St. Luke Catholic Church on 3/29 and 3/30. A team member will attend the Jessamine County Farmers Market event kickoff on May 3rd to explain the program to event attendees. Thus far, the community has been very positive about the program and many recognize the need for it while there are those that did not realize that hunger was such an issue in Jessamine County.
Currently our outreach efforts are focused on raising awareness among home growers and farmers that the WiN-WiN program exists as an outlet for their excess produce, and that their donation will support efforts to reduce food waste and food insecurity in their community. Our outreach efforts are county-wide to inform people of the WiN-WiN program using a combination of flyers and social media- a local college; places of worship; K-12 schools (8,392 students); farm supply, garden, landscape, and feed stores and Future Farmers of America plant sale; Chamber of Commerce and local government service organizations; Cooperative Extension Services; local newspaper; local businesses; and local radio. The donated food will then be provided to our five non-profit partner organizations that are feeding those experiencing food and nutrition insecurity.
Project Outcomes
At this time surplus food has not been collected, but the critical point of the feeding chain to be addressed in April is food collection and transport. We have worked with and continue to work with our drop-off sites to establish collection methods that promote the reduction of FLW. In mid-April we will observe Glean KY as they collect and transport food to a recipient community feeding organization. As we go through these processes we will document best practices to reduce FLW with the drop-off collection sites and transporting produce to a community feeding organization. Outreach material will be developed from these best practices.
Specific recommendations will be made in future reports that address the identified critical points to reduce FLW at the time of gleaning to when food is received by these different models of community feeding programs.