Taking Action

As the taking action part of our project, we suggest Hopkins takes three
steps towards increasing our environmental sustainability. First, we advise
Hopkins to increase the number of compost bins because students at Hopkins
tend to eat at places outside of the cafeteria. Students and teachers bring food to
the library, their offices and classrooms and with in increase in compost bins the
waste can be properly processed. Second, Hopkins should start its own compost
because we could use it to fertilize the fields and it would cut down the costs of
hiring maintenance to take out the compost. This proposition is in direct
opposition to how the maintenance sprays the fields with pesticides in order to
regrow grass and the compost could be started in the forest surrounding
Hopkins. The group is in talks with Mr. Roberts discussing the overall cost and
logistics of this move. Finally for the main action of this group, we propose
Hopkins donates food from the Athletic Banquet, Homecoming and Back To
School Bash cookouts to local New Haven pantries. The group is currently in
talks with Mr. King in making that happen. We asked him to disclose the details
of a plan that is already in place, but he has yet to get back to us.

Introduction
A problem that has plagued many cafeterias in the United States, including
that of Hopkins School, is food waste. Though many people are malnourished or
undernourished, United States lunch programs waste an exorbitant amount of
food every day. In many cases it is the simple issue of the eyes being bigger than
the stomach. We are not trying to waste, but we (forgive the phrase) tend to bite

off more than we can chew. It is not only an issue that Hopkins is creating. Food
waste from schools in the United States is currently at an all time high. It is a
problem that spans across private and public schools, free lunch and paid
programs, high schools and colleges. It has become a political, environmental and
social issue that we need to turn around.
Science of Waste
Waste is generally known as food that is thrown out because it can not be
re-eaten or reused. In many peoples homes, they separate the actual waste, their
trash material like food and other products that cant be reused, and their
recyclables, plastics, aluminums, and other material that can be reused or turned
into something. Americans throw away enough garbage everyday to fill 63,000
garbage trucks which, if lined up end to end for an entire year, would stretch
halfway to the moon. Of the garbage Americans throw out, half could be recycled,
which is enough to fill a football stadium from top to bottom everyday. Of the
food being bought from stores, Americans throw away almost half of it; this ends
up being $165 million dollars annually. This waste is either food that is stored at
leftovers and isnt eaten or food that goes rotten. But its not just food from our
homes; stores that dont sell bruised fruits and vegetables or have to get rid of the
older foods on the shelves contribute to the amount of waste. Not only does this

waste a lot of money every year, but it adds to the already existing piles of waste

we create every day.

With managing waste, it goes to landfills, which are a combination of soil

and the trash that it dumped there. There is always an alternation between soil
and the trash: after the waste is dumped into the hole that is dug up, it is topped
off with at least six inches of dirt. When the landfill reaches capacity, there is a
cap put in, and it is designed to provide a long-term cover. One of the problems
we are facing now is that there is too much trash that we know what do with.
Americans throw out tons of trash every day, and the trash is being put into the
ground, but there is but so much space to put the trash. Since a large percentage
of the stuff being thrown out could be recycled, this would produce less trash and
more material, like plastic and aluminum, would be reused. Composting leftover
food would also mean that there is less trash going to landfills. Instead of
throwing away any food that it not finished or goes bad, it could be composted at
home, or taken away by a composting company, that then can use it for the
ground.

Waste at Hopkins School

Waste is prevalent across the world, with around 40% of food being
thrown out by people in the United States. This national trend can also be found
at Hopkins School, although other impressive school movements sometimes
blind us. When asked about the about of bags taken out from the kitchen on an
average day, Mike King, Director of Dining Services at Hopkins School, said that:
It depends Well if you were to ask me how much the students themselves
actually waste I would say quite a bit. I probably throw out a full case of apples
per week In the course of a week, there are certain students who waste enough
food to feed 12 people. We probably take out 6 bags of compost (200 lbs of
compost a day) and then the garbage is a little less. In the kitchen, the waste is
unavoidable. Although we have seen an improvement of composting in the
Hopkins community throughout the course of the last few years, the amount of
waste from regular school days still continues to pile up with uneducated
amounts of food per serving and waste from the kitchen. Other common food
items that are discarded at school include soup: Soup is discarded often times
what we will start a soup earlier in the week that's like an onion soup or a beef
vegetable soup, and if it been within proper temperature control they can stain it
and the brother can be used again if we can get something out of it we will try.
The attempt at re-using these soups is a great effort by the kitchen staff and takes
extra manpower to proper heat/cool the soups. An easy fix would be to send these
soups to a food bank where they can be immediately consumed. This school day
waste would be difficult to deliver daily to the Connecticut Food Bank. But, if a
truck comes everyday we would not only lower waste at Hopkins, but we would

be able to feed others that are less fortunate. Not only do we have waste from
regular school days, but we also have a ton of annual waste from school events
such as the athletic banquet, prom, etc.. This waste is then either thrown out by
the school or thrown out by the catering companies. In order to solve this waste
problem at Hopkins, a partnership between the Connecticut Food Bank and
Hopkins should be made. This relationship would allow the CT Food Bank to

come and pick up unused, safe and edible food items that would otherwise be

wasted.

National school waste

Food waste at high schools and colleges has been a large scale issue.
particularly in the United States. Here we will look at how waste is produced in
both institutions, since Hopkins is a high school but is closer to the setup of
college lunch. In the United States, we throw away over 34 million tons of food
per year. Individuals often view the issue as so impersonal and unfixable because
it is so large. It is hard to take responsibility for something that appears so
massive, so we generally dont. The truth is that our individual contributions can
easily be changed to reduce the amount of food waste from 200 pounds per
person per year, where it currently stands. With 48 million US citizens in food
insecure homes, as of 2014, the amount of waste we generate is unacceptable.

In public high schools the issue lies in required food. The National Nutrition
Standards for Foods was implemented in order to improve dietary health
amongst young people at public schools. The idea of the requirements is to allow
more students access to fresh fruits and vegetables. Unfortunately, a recent study
found that 81.2 percent of schools saw an increase in food waste once the federal
regulations were put into place. The regulations do not just require the healthy
options to be made available, rather they say each child must have certain foods
on their plate. This becomes an issue when most students would rather throw
away the food they are given, because they do not like it or it is simply too much
for them to eat. It is hard to mitigate the issue of food waste when it would result
in less healthy schools. Still when children are throwing away the food they are
required to take, food waste and malnutrition increases.
In colleges and universities in the US, the setup is somewhat like Hopkins.
In programs where one meal swipe means all you can eat, students tend to take
as much as they can in order to get their moneys worth. No paying for lunch or
paying for all you can eat style services actually makes it easier to waste, because
one is prone to take more food and having to throw out what they cannot
manage. Many schools have combatted this waste by composting it, but this still
means that food is being grown, prepared, and transported only to go uneaten.
This is still a waste of water, gasoline, and manpower.
One method of making sure food gets eaten from cafeterias is through giveaway
programs. On both a school wide and an individual level, these programs get food
from those who cannot use it to those who can and will. The only issue is making
sure students eat carefully, so that leftovers remain sanitary. Programs such as

the re-plating movement spearheaded by Sustainable America or phone apps

such as Leftoverswap encourage sharing of food that would otherwise be tossed
out. Along with this, a good way of forcing people to confront how much they
waste is by using a visual m(perhaps displaying the waste in clear bins as has
been done in several universities) to force people to view the amount they really
throw out at meals.
Waste and Production Internationally
The political and economic debate on food has less to do with waste and
more to do with food consumption. Nevertheless, food consumption and food
waste are political topics that separate a developed country from a developing.
Because of the 2006-2008 food-pricing spike, making sure everyone has a
healthy diet and lifestyle is a major goal of the UN. Therefore for this part of the
paper, we will focus on the production of food and how it plays into wasting food.
Small farmers in the Global South grow about 70% of the worlds food.
However due to free markets and historical oppression many of these farmers
make little money. First addressing historical oppression, many countries in the
Global South were once colonies of European powers. This previous relationship
with world is important because citizens within these ex-colonies may only see
themselves as exporters and people who are situated in the country simply to give
raw materials to another country.
Free market capitalism is good for those corporations who are wealthy. On
the contrary many developing nations are exploited because liberalization in the
economy. For example, we now see a blossoming fast food and super market
sector because of liberalization, which encourages foreign investment. Perhaps

the worst part of a free market is that it forces dependency. The food spike in
2006-2008 occurred because liberalization of the economy forced developing
nations to be dependent on imported foods. Farmers too feel the effects of
markets with little regulation. Due to financial policies by the IMF and World
Bank, big US corporations can come in and wipe out small farms with their
industrial food production. Another part of the problem that the investment of
corporations enforces is how we have one region of the world producing almost
all of our food. We simply cannot expect to curtail production if industrial farms
plague entire contents because corporate farms have low crop yields and decrease
biodiversity.
While the future looks grim for developing countries and the world
population, there is hope because many studies suggest that we can produce
enough food to maintain a world population of 9 billion with sustainable farms
and normal animal breeding patterns. One solution is to give food sovereignty to
nations instead of corporations because small local farms can produce a higher
yield, perpetuate biodiversity and maintain sustainability for a community. The
downside to these solutions is that countries that do not care for healthy living
standards or prefer political power to the environment can simply have a
corporation do their farming. Therefore perhaps the best solution is to get NGOs,
and possibly corporations, to work with local farmers in supplying them
financially in order to feed their local communities.
Food waste is a complicated issue in the world because it speaks to
allocation issues, wealth, science, politics, small neighborhoods and nations. I
hope this paper explained in depth the local, the US, international and scientific

problems of food waste and production. Although waste in general is a problem

with how we are living, food waste is a special problem because it is human
nature to not waste food and throwing away food is such a tangible reality. If we
are to survive as a civilization, everyone has a role in promoting sustainable
forms of living and consumption.