A WEEKLY GUIDE OF TIPS TO REDUCING FOOD WASTE

REDUCE, REUSE AND SAVE MONEY! 

Every day at GWI, we see food waste. We see good food and bad, and all types of compostable waste. But food waste predominates all of the other types of waste we capture. Everyone, without exception, creates food waste. Every food preparation scrap or uneaten bite is waste. Every mold covered dish hiding in the back of the refrigerator…all of it is wasted food. Our ability to compost it and grow more of it defines sustainability. But even so, and as good as that is, shouldn’t we do what we can to reduce it?  

So, here’s what Green With Indy is going to do:
Every week we will publish tips on how to reduce the amount of food waste created and share our perspective on what we eat, and why and how it impacts our earth. Hopefully, you will enjoy what’s offered and share, share, share. And when in doubt, share again.

So, let’s begin with some basic benefits to reducing food waste:

It saves you money by buying less food and having less to compost.

• Monitoring your food waste directly relates to your pocketbook. If you were a commercial kitchen, this would be called an audit. This is where evaluating your waste and assigning a $ value to it, will quickly identify how much money you are throwing away daily or weekly.

It keeps food out of landfills and reduces methane emissions. This lowers your carbon (fossil fuel) footprint. It’s the soot that oil leaves behind. Soot is not compostable.

• The earth is blazin’, freakin’ hot and food rotting in a landfill adds methane gas, which conducts and holds more heat than carbon monoxide. Hands down, it’s the single, most important reason to reduce waste or compost what’s wasted. So, less food rotting in a landfill means less gas heating up the atmosphere. In a nutshell, life on the planet continues. A basic, right? Also, you can’t grow food in a landfill. Also relevant.

• It conserves energy and resources. Waste-related pollution involved in the growing, manufacturing, transporting, and selling of food (not to mention hauling the food waste and then landfilling it) decreases. Conversely, increasing the number of small, locally-owned organic family farms reduces our vulnerability to corporate food systems.

• It supports your community by providing donated untouched food that would have otherwise gone to waste and shows that we care for each other.

• Compost through #greenwithindy. It is the last thing to do that reduces food waste. Nothing better defines sustainability…it’s the circle of life of food.

To learn more, subscribe for curbside food waste compost collection: www.greenwithindy.com/product-page