Connecting Communities: Bridging the Gap to Direct Surplus Food to Los Angeles County Food Deserts

Commodities

Practices

• Sustainable Communities: food loss and waste recovery/reduction

FoodCycle will address previously
identified gaps in food recovery that continue to contribute to
food loss. It will build upon, enhance, and expand previously
identified successful strategies to prevent food loss and waste.
Addressing the gaps that have been noted will help implement
existing policies. 

California Senate Bill SB 1383
requires businesses to donate surplus edible food. However,
enforcement of the law relies on local jurisdictions, which need
more resources to effectively educate businesses and their staff
about the requirements. As a result, large quantities of edible
food continue to be wasted, while business staffers need to be
made aware of what is required of them. 

FoodCycle recognizes the crucial
role of business partners in our mission. We will work with them
throughout Los Angeles County to develop training programs and
encourage more donations of edible food. Their participation is
appreciated and integral to our program's success.

This project focuses on creating
collaborative networks with local and state governments and
nonprofits that are feeding people directly. It will address food
insecurity, concentrating on the underserved communities
identified as "food deserts" in Los Angeles County. It is about
empowering these communities to meet their own needs. It will
actively engage communities and their constituents in addressing
systemic issues in the food system that result in food
waste.

FoodCycle's proposal will
incorporate a previously piloted collaborative transportation
network, which has diverted 28 million pounds of food since 2019.
It will integrate the app Careit to streamline logistics and
reporting, leverage FoodCycle's system of electric vehicles and
solar-powered shared refrigeration units, and expand our network
of community partners to include additional organizations working
in historically underserved areas of Los Angeles County. This
project has the potential to encourage cross-sectoral
collaboration among regional stakeholders, efficiently use
available resources, and create a cohesive strategy to educate
the public and address food waste. This comprehensive approach
will complement regional and state priorities while allowing for
national coordination and impacts.

1. Create outreach materials to produce behavioral change on
   both the consumer and business level. Education materials will focus on consumer
   behavioral change and education of staff and administration at
   Edible Food Waste Generators.  Targe audience includes
   wholesale vendors, retail establishments, and individuals
   receiving food assistance. FoodCycle will work with the Los
   Angeles Department of Environment and Sanitation and local
   waste haulers to identify food loss and waste “hotspots” to
   follow up and provide solutions.
2. Develop outreach programs to encourage increased food
   donation and address identified gaps resulting in food waste in
   Los Angeles County. Collaborate with stakeholders to develop
   outreach and training programs with local entities working to
   enforce regulatory compliance in conjunction with
   cross-sectoral collaboration. Outreach materials for businesses
   will include training videos, manuals, training in integration
   with online tracking technologies and reporting, and guides to
   best practices.  Outreach strategies will incorporate
   plans to share the results with various audiences, including
   students, researchers, NGOs, local and regional governments,
   and community organizations. All strategies will ensure that
   local efforts at food waste loss and prevention align with
   regional priorities as well as with national coordination and
   impacts.
3. Identify and Educate Community Partners working with
   underserved populations in Los Angeles County.  Conduct outreach to identify
   community partners serving food insecure populations, assess
   needs, and better integrate surplus food into the existing food
   supply chain and hunger relief programs. Create capacity assessments of nonprofit
   organizations to identify and prioritize communities with the
   most critical needs for food assistance and to increase the
   self-reliance of these communities in providing for their own
   food needs.
4. To increase communities' self-reliance in providing for
   their own food needs,
   engage community stakeholders in quarterly trainings and
   community meetings to work with nonprofit community partners
   distributing food and assisting them in increasing impact and
   addressing identified needs. These stakeholder meetings will
   build upon and expand relationships between community-based
   organizations that distribute food, encouraging collaboration
   and network building among participants.
5. Schedule in-person annual conferences in Years Two and
   Three for all stakeholders
   to support collaborative efforts to create pathways to
   strengthen local and regional food rescue and get surplus food
   to feed those experiencing food and nutrition insecurity in Los
   Angeles County while reducing food loss and food waste. Ensure
   stakeholder involvement in planning, evaluating, and delivering
   training(s).
6. Develop collaborative partnerships and interdisciplinary
   efforts across the food system. Work with the Los Angeles Department of
   Public Works and Department of Sanitation and local waste
   haulers to assess businesses' compliance with existing food
   donation requirements.  FoodCycle staff will bring
   expertise in food donation to inform decision-making by local
   government and will work collectively with nonprofit partners,
   regional and state government, and impacted businesses to
   educate Edible Waste Generators and the public. These
   strategies align with USDA Food Loss and Waste Reduction
   program recommendations and regional priorities on food loss
   and waste initiatives and solutions.  They focus on
   interdisciplinary efforts and existing partnerships across the
   food system that will endure beyond the life of the
   project.
7. Support cross-sectoral communications to encourage systemic
   change. FoodCycle will work
   with the government, businesses, and nonprofits to communicate
   and elicit feedback.  We will schedule meetings with
   stakeholders to facilitate collaboration and request input from
   our nonprofit stakeholders representing historically
   underserved communities. The results of these meetings will
   inform our  FoodCycle, and we will share them with our
   partners working on the project.
8. Identify and focus outreach on “hot spots” contributing to
   food waste. Use
   FoodCycle-trained staff to educate business staff about which
   types of food can be donated. This program will build upon and
   update previously piloted programs that educate businesses
   about best practices in food donation. This earlier pilot
   resulted in a 5000% increase in donated food over the previous
   five years. 
9. Schedule increased pickups from
   donors to ensure that surplus food is picked up as needed.
   Initial evaluation and capacity assessment of food donors will
   integrate responsive follow-up that may
   include increased pickups and additional information about
   other categories of food that can be included in
   donations.
10. Support composting or using inedible food to feed animals to
    eliminate waste post-distribution. Work with community partners to integrate
    composting of inedible food received from businesses. Track
    amounts of inedible food currently being lost post-consumer
    distribution.  Develop strategies to compost or redirect
    surplus food from food banks and pantries to other partners
    serving food-insecure communities.
11. Track program outcomes and collect data using the Careit
    app.
12. Reports will
    include the total amount of food lost or wasted (in
    pounds annually) from points of origin (indicated by city and
    zip codes) and the composition of the diverted surplus food
    based on the categories of meat, dairy, grains, produce, and
    other items, as well as number of meals served to food insecure
    households.
13. Create a detailed report summary outlining methodology,
    impact, conclusions, and recommendations. The report will include baseline food loss and waste
    levels and improvements that result from these programs. 
    The report will include information about how these programs
    align with the EPAs designated Food Loss and Waste Prevention
    strategies and outline the results of improvements made by
    adopting innovative technologies in the food recovery space.
    The final report will incorporate an outreach component of the
    project to share the results with various audiences, including
    students, government entities, local community leaders, food
    donors, and attendees at regional and national
    conferences.