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Advocacy in Action!
TSUAg’s Human Sciences Dept. Holds Important Food Waste Prevention Summit
By Charlie Morrison
Determined to positively impact the interconnected conversation of food waste, hunger, and sustainability that’s happening across the globe and right here in Nashville, TSUAg’s Department of Human Sciences in April hosted the “No Food Left Behind” food waste prevention summit. The event brought together leaders from Nashville’s Metro government, food waste and sustainability non-profits, mission-based for-profit companies, and of course, TSUAg faculty members who collectively took a deep dive into the urgent matter of of food sustainability at the event.
“Food waste is a universal concern throughout the nation, from the farms, manufacturers, and consumers. Holding the event showed how Tennessee’s advocacy has and continues to position us as a vital constituent for food insecurity, sustainability, and waste prevention, especially with food waste.”
Held in the TSUAg Agricultural Information Technology Center on the evening of April 1, the No Food Left Behind event kicked off with a slew of presenters from across the public and private sectors here in Nashville. The panel assembled for the discussion featured representatives from many of the key organizations addressing food sustainability in the Music City. In addition to the inperson event, a further 150 individuals took part in the event virtually, heightening the reach of No Food Left Behind beyond the key players and the TSUAg campus.
Linda Breggin, longtime senior attorney with the Environmental Law Institute in Washington, D.C., and now a Lecturer in Law at the Vanderbilt University Law School, provided the group her overarching legal perspective of the issues surrounding the topic. Rev. Karen McIntyre, founder of the Village at Glencliff, a non-profit shelter providing relief from homelessness and food insecurity, provided a counterpoint to Breggin’s talk, an examination of the issue from a “boots on the ground” perspective.
“Food waste prevention is the one thing all of us can do to impact climate change, save money, and feed the hungry simultaneously,” said Rev. McIntyre in an interview with AgLink after the summit. “An event like this helps make people aware of the severity of this problem and its relatively easy solution. Awareness makes us encourage each other, our employers, businesses, and schools to solve the food waste problem. Rescuing food costs next to nothing and the benefits more than outweigh the costs.”
The concept of community feeding community espoused by Rev. McIntyre was backed by another pair of food and sustainability non-profits who appeared at No Food Left Behind, the Nashville Food Project and the Society of St. Andrew. The Nashville Food Project’s Chief Program Officer Hanes Motsinger spoke on the important role community gardening can play in feeding the food insecure, and the Society of St. Andrew’s Regional Director for Tennessee, Rev. Jeannie Hunter, redirected the talk to the agriculture industry, where food waste is rampant.
“There’s so much work to be done to understand what’s happening upstream that is actually creating the food waste at our grocery stores, at our farms, at our distribution facilities,” said Motsinger in an interview with AgLink. “Those are the entities where food waste is getting passed on to the landfills in the greatest quantities.
Yes, individuals are wasting food, but the broader system is an almost bigger problem.”
Jenn Harrman, Program Manager of the Metro Nashville Government Waste Service’s Zero Waste program brought public policy and an examination of the problem through a local lens into the No Food Left Behind discussion. “Food waste and other organic materials make up a quarter of all the waste we send to landfill in Nashville, where it is the single largest contributor to methane gas emissions in landfills,” said Harrman to AgLink. “All of this material could readily be kept out of the landfill through waste prevention, recovery, and composting benefitting our environment and enriching local soils.”
Sustainability consultant and Sheeco Events co-owner Diana Andrew, along with Compost Company Co-Owner and CEO Jeffrey Ezell spoke on their approaches to facilitating food waste prevention from the perspective of mission-based for-profit companies.
“It is critical to talk about food waste and solutions to the problem because if we are going to make a significant difference, we need to engage everyone,” said Ezell to AgLink. “We are making amazing strides through huge efforts of people and organizations working to combat food waste at every level. That said, there is so much more we can do and achieve. As long as there are hungry people and food going to landfills, we aren’t doing enough.”
TSUAg Human Sciences Adjunct Professor Sharon Suggs rounded out the event by bringing the message of food waste prevention back to the individual. “The core message that I presented was advocacy for food waste from the household perspective,” said Suggs. “Simple changes to household food practices can begin a significant contribution to food waste.”
Suggs and the Human Sciences team brought in TSUAg Human Sciences grad and chef Tim Winn of Lighthouse on the Lake to put that message into practice during the “Waste to Taste” demonstration during which Suggs and Winn demonstrated recipes utilizing leftovers and food waste. “Waste to Taste shared how household waste impacts the food waste situation, as well sharing ways to utilize existing foods in one’s cupboard and donating items not used to stakeholders, organizations and other programs for people in need,” said Suggs.
The Human Sciences Department was encouraged with the turnout for the event and the quality of the discussions, and is considering making No Food Left Behind an annual event.
