Food waste occurs more frequently than people may think. It can happen in homes, restaurants, grocery stores, and even in farm fields. In America, nearly 40% of all food is wasted. One of our partners, Society of St. Andrew (SoSA), is a nonprofit food rescue organization that focuses on offering nourishment to those in need.
Throughout 2022, Move For Hunger assisted the Society of St. Andrew by moving 26 loads of fresh produce throughout 5 states; North Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Delaware, and Maryland. The produce included sweet potatoes, watermelons, zucchini, peppers, cucumbers, and squash! In total, our transportation network helped recover over 660,000 lbs of fresh produce which provided more than 500,000 meals!
This year, one of our main focuses remains on recovering fresh food from farm fields, which is where Society of St. Andrew comes in. SoSA is well known for their sweet potato drops. During these potato drops, 40,000 lbs of loose sweet potatoes are dropped in parking lots by using an agricultural dump truck.
After these potatoes are dropped, volunteers sort and arrange these sweet potatoes into 10 lb bags to prepare for local food banks. Move For Hunger has been able to ship these potatoes several hours away so that volunteers can distribute these sweet potatoes throughout different counties.
Sweet potatoes are vital for the diets of those with food insecurity because they are a fast-growing vitamin A rich nutritious crop that can help reduce malnutrition, as well as deliver improved food security and nutritious outcomes. Through our partnership, SoSA has conducted these potato drops across the east coast, providing fresh produce for food insecure individuals across several communities.
In 2023, we have already dropped nutritious potatoes to 22 communities in need. By donating our transportation networks’ services for these fresh produce recoveries, SoSA has been able to save money, giving them the opportunity to go after even more donated fresh produce, which often has packing fees tied to them. Our collaboration with SoSA has allowed us to leverage each other’s strengths to provide more healthy food to the hunger relief system.
At their core, Society of St Andrew is a gleaning organization that brings people together to harvest and share healthy food, reduce food waste, and build caring communities by offering nourishment to hungry neighbors. Gleaning has been around for about 4,000 years, however, it has grown more popular on farms in the past few years. SoSA is one of the largest gleaning organizations in our country. SoSA coordinates volunteers, growers, and distribution agencies to rescue this food from fields before it is lost as waste.
With over 830,000 lbs already distributed this year, we are thrilled to ramp up efforts in 2023 and recover even more fresh produce. Collaborating with SoSA has been amazing because we get to work with a like-minded organization who shares the same mission as us.
We are very grateful for our partnership with the Society of St. Andrew and are excited for the future opportunities that lie ahead.
Learn more about food waste and our Fresh Food Program.
