M Focus on: Waste & Recycling
Love Food, Fight Waste promotes community education to enact positive change By NICHOLETTE CARLSON | The Municipal
Working with Table to Table in various aspects and programs over the years, it was natural for Iowa City to reach out to the organization once more when looking for ways to increase food waste diversion within the community. Jane Wilch, Iowa City recycling coordinator, suggested the city “do something a little more permanent in our food waste program.” A program called Love Food, Fight Waste started this year to further the education of residents in both Iowa City and Johnson County on simple ways to help eliminate food waste and keep it out of both the landfill and compost pile. Looking at statistics from 2017, approximately 25% of what entered the local landfill was food waste. There are many wasted resources — from agricultural to business — that go into food waste. When food waste is put into a landfill, it produces methane gas as it decomposes, which contributes to climate issues. One goal of Iowa City is to help positively affect climate change by reducing methane emissions. Even when food waste is sent to a compost facility, there are still many resources wasted. In honor of the national Stop Food Waste Day on April 27, Iowa City officially launched its Love Food, Fight Waste program. The first When Iowa City’s Love Food, Fight Waste three months have very specific topics to aid in the public’s education. program began at the end of April, the first topic was May’s topic was “Know Your Best By, Use By and Sell By Dates.” June’s topic was “Understand the Types of Food Waste.” July’s topic was “Buy “Know Your Best By, Use By and Sell By Dates.” These magnets were given to residents and participants for free to give them the Right Amount of Food.” According to Wilch, “The program is very young, and we are just reminders of how long food lasts. It also provides tips for storing starting to build traction with it. We anticipate it to be a year long, but food when excess is received. ((Photo provided by Iowa City, Iowa) it may go even longer.” These three initial topics were chosen intentionally to give residents getting started with the program a solid essential foundation to make being left open-ended and can change from month to month dependmore conscious choices for eliminating and reducing food waste. ing on how the program evolves and what the community needs. Each month, the city communicated with the residents on fighting These topics cover simple, practical ways any resident can help positively affect the reduction of food waste at home. One of the simplest food waste via city newsletters, the city website and several social suggestions includes eating a snack before going to the grocery store. media pages. The hope is also to have an archived page on the Table Following these three initial topics, Love Food, Fight Waste will to Table website so, if an individual joins the program later on, they move on to more complicated topics and collaborate with other pro- can still view previous topics. The Love Food, Fight Waste program grams throughout the community. These collaborations will help to will also further its reach as other local organizations partner to broaden the audience for the program. The city is also teaming up promote the program. As local events take place pertaining to food with the schools to include fighting food waste as part of the school waste, the program will also participate in these to continue to reach curriculum in September. Wilch mentioned that further topics are more residents. 26 THE MUNICIPAL | AUGUST 2022
