What's Being Done to Fight the World's Food Waste Problem?

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Every year, 1.3 billion tons of food is lost or wasted by consumers and retailers around the world. This is more than the net total food production of Sub-Saharan Africa, and enough to feed the estimated 900 million people hungry in the world, according to the Food and Agricultural Organization. In the U.S. alone, about 40 percent of all edible food goes to waste, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council, a figure made all the more ominous when considering the 50 million Americans currently classified as food insecure.

It’s safe say that the world has a food waste problem. Luckily, many groups, individuals and movements are stepping up with both large and small-scale efforts to fight food waste worldwide.

Food Waste Collected, Composted for NYC Rooftop Gardens

Rather than buying compost for rooftop gardens, The Durst Organization, Inc. creates its own from employee food waste. Photo: Flickr/Egan Snow

A freshman from Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia serves up meals to hungry neighbors at a local community table. Photo: Flickr/SJU Undergraduate Admissions

Two Red Lobster employees prepare food for donation through the Darden Harvest program. The program has donated more than 62 million pounds of unserved food to food banks and food rescue programs since 2003. Photo: Darden Restaurants

Photo: Stephan Rosales, the produce assistant team leader at a Whole Foods Market in Austin, Texas, cuts broccoli for a customer. Photo: Whole Foods Market

Manhattan might not have the sprawling, open fields you’d typically think of when considering compost as garden fertilizer, but one New York City company is taking the idea straight to the top of the city’s skyline.

The Durst Organization, Inc., a real estate company whose properties include spots at the World Trade Center, Bryant Park and Times Square, has begun collecting compostable food waste from 11 of its Manhattan properties. The waste is transported upstate to be turned into compost, then returned to the city to fertilize rooftop gardens.

It’s all part of The Durst Organization’s green rooftop initiative, which will spend between $750,000 and $1 million to install over an acre of green rooftop space throughout its NYC properties, according to The Wall Street Journal.

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