Co-op News | Summer Quarterly 2017
The Cost of Weird
People have been proven to purchase product that is more visually appealing. But in a time when 46 percent of fruits and vegetables never make it from farm to fork for aesthetic reasons, contributing to 25 percent of methane emissions in a country where one in ten people experience food insecurity, it may be time to rethink the way we perceive food.
About 95 percent of the food we throw away ends up in landfills.
If wasted food was a country, it would be the third largest producer of carbon dioxide in the world, after the United States and China.
About 30 percent of produce from farms won't be the right size or color, or it might have blemishes, scars, scratches, fungus, or spiders.
According to the EPA, the best opportunity for preventing food waste is at the source.
Seventeen million households in the United States are food insecure.
The Co-op donates about 30-40 pounds of foods to Food for People, a local food bank, daily.
When produce is moldy or wilting, the Co-op donates it to a local livestock farmer for feed.
