FareShare urges food industry to share surplus to counter UK nutrition insecurity

12 Jan 2024 --- UK’s food waste charity FareShare launches a winter campaign to help turn surplus food into meals for people in need, joining forces with food and drink retailers, manufacturers and food service operators. 

Nutrition Insight meets up with the organization to discuss the goal of its latest campaign. 

“FareShare is calling on food businesses to share their seasonal surplus with those in need in winter. The demand for our food has skyrocketed, yet there is still so much surplus food that could go to people who need it,” Lucy Allison, FareShare's head of food industry, tells us. 

“We know that surplus food can be put to good use — it’s what we do. In 2022 — 23, 91% of the food we provided was excess that otherwise would have gone to waste. By signing up, a business’s seasonal surplus can make a huge difference in people’s lives across the UK.” 

“No good food to waste” 
The organization delivers the equivalent of 128 million meals a year, an average of four meals a second, to people in need across the UK. At the same time, FareShare needs more food to keep up with demand. 

“FareShare believes that no good food should go to waste. We work across the food industry, including supermarkets, farmers, growers and manufacturers, to get good-to-eat food that can’t be sold to our network of 8,500 charities and community groups across the UK,” explains Allison. 

“These charities provide vital wraparound services and help tackle the root causes of poverty, including afterschool and breakfast clubs, homelessness charities, community centers and older people’s lunch clubs.” 

FareShare calls on businesses to contact the charity: “We need food businesses we aren’t currently working with to get in touch to find out how they can support the million-plus people we support across the UK.” 

Simon Millard, director of food at Fareshare, adds: “This initiative helps the environment too — for every ton of surplus food we’ve redistributed, we’ve prevented the waste of two (metric) tons of CO2e and 2.66 million liters of water. Through reducing emissions and providing meals to people who need them, FareShare takes the environmental problem of food waste and turns it into a social good.” 

UK food insecurity 
According to Allison, almost 14 million people, including four million children, face food insecurity in the UK. “That’s one in four people worried about where their next meal comes from.”

“At the same time, three million (metric) tons of food goes to waste on farms across the UK.” 

FareShare works with the food industry to get good, surplus food that can’t be sold to a network of charities and community groups.FareShare cautions that the cost of living crisis has devastated people who were already struggling. 

“Charities and community groups across the country are reporting exceptionally high levels of demand for their services and are struggling to keep up. Receiving food from FareShare enables these organizations to continue offering vital services to support people in need,” says Allison. 

“Food insecurity fuels both hunger and loneliness. Inviting friends or accepting invitations without enough food becomes a challenge, affecting children and adults.” 

Last year, the Dutch organization Foodvalley NL flagged that worldwide, one-third of food produced is lost or wasted yearly. 

Coronation Food Project 
Recently, FareShare helped bring together leaders from the UK food industry to support the Coronation Food Project to reduce and redistribute surplus food waste. 

The project aims to provide more food to support people in the UK who experience food security. It will target all food waste in the supply chain, building on existing industry initiatives to redistribute surplus food to charities. 

Moreover, the project encourages supermarkets and food manufacturers to join FareShare’s Alliance Manufacturing program. 

According to Allison, this program “seeks to unlock more surplus food for redistribution by bringing project members together to share their surplus, underutilized and donated resources in all forms — food, packaging, labor hours and factory or distribution capacity.” 

Meanwhile, as consumers are encouraged to waste and consume less, organizations and researchers indicate the potential to mitigate food loss and waste by investing in side streams and science. 

By Jolanda van Hal