Are Current Policies Enough to Minimize Food Waste on College Campuses?
During my first time at the USC Village, the first thing that popped up into my mind was “why are there so many trashcans right next to each other?”, however upon closer inspection, they were all for different things — one for compost, recycle, landfill, and liquids. This was a shocker to me because ever since my childhood, I had only seen trash bin for trash or recyclables, never for compost or liquids. So, after this realization I was surprised to see that USC was somewhat conscious about food waste, since these trashcans were the only things implemented to minimize the amount of food being wasted. Other than these trashcans, I have never seen any posters, infographics, or even education about food waste anywhere on campus or online. So this made me question, do college campuses actually do enough to minimize food waste among its students?
To start out, I think we should begin to understand food waste and how big of a deal it actually is. Food waste, in this context, refers to food that is not used right before preparation, after preparation, and after being served to consumers. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, “food waste is estimated at between 30–40 percent of the food supply… [which] corresponded to approximately 133 billion pounds” in 2010. However, of these 133 billion pounds, 22 million pounds of food is wasted by college campuses a year — equating to about 142 pounds of food waste per students per year, based on a program in Massachusetts called Recycling Works. This is insane to think about, since my weight is about the same as the food being wasted by each student per year. It isn’t 142 pounds of food being wasted per year, but PER STUDENT. It is also shocking to know that about 1/3 of food in the US is tossed, even though there are so many people who go hungry every day. You can only imagine how much of world hunger can be solved if food was not tossed unnecessarily. After realizing this, you should be concerned by these statistics because of how easy it can be to prevent food from ending up in a landfill. However, this is beside the point because in this essay I will only be focusing on food waste from college campuses, the reasons to them, and what solutions are in place.
As you already know, food waste is a huge problem on college campuses. Since most dining halls are all you can eat (AYCE), the presence of food being wasted is pretty much inevitable. At AYCE dining halls, Universities have to ensure that the kitchen does not run out of food, therefore it is inevitable that “there will be more food prepared than consumed,” especially when it is impossible to accurately predict the amount of food that students will eat in a given day (Nakagome). Additionally, since students have already paid for their AYCE meal, they have no financial obligation in finishing whatever food they placed on their plate, so anything that does not appeal to their palate can easily be thrown away. In a study done by the Menus of Change University Research Collaborative (MCURC), it was found that an “increased confidence in liking a dish before choosing it also led to a higher amount of it being taken, but less being wasted”. This doesn’t come at a surprise because students who know the menu and how the food being served tastes like beforehand will waste less food than those who are eat at the dining halls for the first time. Additionally, MCURC found that “a higher amount of food being taken was also related to more food being wasted”. This may be due to the students not being able to finish the whole plate, not having enough time, or just simply not enjoying the food that they thought they would. Going back to what I said before, if students do not like a dish, they can easily just toss it in the trash because they will have no financial repercussions in doing so, whereas forcing themselves to eat something that they don’t like may cause them to lose their appetite instead. As a result, buffet-style dining halls contribute to the ever-growing problem of food waste on college campuses.
Since not all dining halls are AYCE, these other dining halls may be contributing to food waste by serving less appealing food. In a study done on a New Zealand University, the most common reasons for food waste were the students being too full or they didn’t like the taste of the food (Mirosa et al.). The first reason has a simple solution, to save the dish for another time when the student becomes hungry. The second reason, however, is a whole different story. There is no simple way to change a student’s appeal towards a meal, so the only way to solve this problem is to focus on the root cause, the quality of the meal. Everyone has a standard on what they expect their meal to taste like, and if that standard isn’t met, it will typically lead to that meal getting tossed. However, if the food does tastes good then the student is more inclined to finishing it rather than tossing it out. Therefore, academic institutions should serve food that meet to the standards of most students, and possibly serve a wider range of dishes so that it can be easier to appeal to a diverse group of students rather than just offering a single dish. An increased amount of options may also increase food waste, therefore composting should be considered in minimizing food waste.
As students begin to enter colleges, it may be their first time learning about composting, just as it was for me. Rather than having food waste enter the landfill, it can be composted into a natural fertilizer for plants, which can positively affect the environment rather than producing methane to contribute towards global warming. It was found that “upperclassmen, especially master’s level students, showed significant difference in comparison of compost knowledge and environmental attitudes” because they were exposed to this information much longer than underclassmen (Holmes et al.). By exposing students to solutions for food waste will lead to them being more conscious about their actions, composting should be taught at an earlier age to expose children on how to divert food waste in a beneficial way. We can already see that college students, after a couple of years being exposed to composting bins, can quickly become conscious of their actions and waste less food. If we were to expose them earlier at a younger age, and for a longer period of time, they will be able to understand how to separate waste into compost, recyclable, or landfill rather than just throwing everything in the bin meant for landfill. As a result, the more knowledge a person has of composting, the less food they would waste.
Now, after hearing of how and why food waste is such as prevalent thing in US universities, we need to look into how colleges are minimizing food waste on their campus. At USC, the plate size at the USC Village Dining Hall is very small, almost resembling the size of a plate used to hold a teacup. The purpose behind this is so students are forced to take a smaller portion size so that they won’t toss food that they are unable to finish if they become too full. Some universities allow students to have take-home boxes where they can keep their unfinished food for a later time. This option is not at USC, surprisingly because it is such a simple solution that can be implemented to prevent food waste yet it is not. When students have a limited time to finish their food before their next class, their unfinished food will be forced into a trash bin or a compost bin rather than being saved for a later time, so in this case the food will be composted unnecessarily. Another solution is by introducing specific bins for different types of waste such as for compost, recycle, landfill, and liquids at USC. Excess food can be composted rather than be sent to a landfill where it will contribute to global warming, or it can be redistributed to “local homeless people, seniors and families in need” (Nakagome). However, food is still being wasted in the U.S. because these steps are not enough to eliminate this problem.
On the other hand, European college students are educated about “the problems linked to food waste [and] are more likely to avoid wasting food” through educational campaigns (Pratesi et al.). In a study done by Pratesi, it was found that 78.6% of respondents received information about food waste on television rather than online or in school. After living in the U.S. and growing up with television during my entire childhood, I have never seen anything about the prevention of food waste or what to do with food waste. Even to this day as a college student, I have not seen any infographic or campaigns that educates me on food waste. The very first that I learned about this was when I went around the USC Village and saw the compost bins, then having done research I was able to understand the problems of food waste and how to prevent it. As a result, U.S. academic institutions should take a lesson from Europe and implement food waste solutions into lower education schools so that children can learn up to become more conscious about food waste.
Why does food waste matter? The food is already prepared, so forcing myself to eat it will not help those who are hungry. These thoughts may have appeared in your mind at some point in your life, however food waste is a huge problem globally. Food waste directly contributes to global warming because when excess food ends up in a landfill, it “can produce methane, a dangerous gas that destroys the ozone layer, producing higher global temperatures” (Houtz). So not only does food waste affect us at a local scale, but it can affect everyone globally. This is why everyone needs to take the necessary steps in separating their waste into the appropriate bins in an effort to minimize both food waste and global warming. Locally, there are people who are in need of food, and the excess food from dining halls can be redistributed to students who are hungry or to the rest of the community such as the homeless, those in need, or seniors.
So, how can we continue to minimize food waste at our universities? Well, colleges need to implement solutions that are already in place such as including to-go boxes for students who are rushing and implement some sort of educational campaign to teach those who have no knowledge on topics like food waste and composting. There should also be some sort of sample like at Costco where students are able to taste food before putting it on their plate to see if they actually like the food rather than finding out that they don’t and then wasting the food by tossing it out. In addition to universities, elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools should take steps in implementing composting bins to allow children to learn about food waste and understand how to take the necessary steps to prevent their negative effects. If possible, schools should prepare food according to demand rather than preparing it all at once. This would prevent overpreparing meals and may even lead to a better tasting meal as it will be fresh rather than reheated. Overall, colleges have implemented some steps in an attempt to minimize food waste, but there is still a long road ahead to further prevent it.
Citations
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Donachie, Pat. “Colleges Combat Food Waste Through Innovation, Dedicated Buy-In.” Higher ED Dive, 20 Nov 2017, https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_works_cited_electronic_sources.html.Accessed 29 November 2021.
“Food Waste Estimation Guide.” Recycling Works Massachusetts, https://recyclingworksma.com/food-waste-estimation-guide/#SourcesForBusinessSectorEstimates. Accessed 29 November 2021.
“Food Waste FAQs.” U.S. Department of Agriculture, https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs. Accessed 29 November 2021.
Holmes, Megan, et al. “The Relationship Between a Campus Composting Program and Environmental Attitudes, Environmental Locus of Control, Compost Knowledge, and Compost Attitudes of College Students.” Hort Technology, vol. 26, no. 5, 2016, pp. 7. American Society for Horticultural Science, doi: https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTTECH03320-16
Mirosa, Miranda, et al. “Reducing Waste of Food Left on Plates: Interventions Based on Means-End Chain Analysis of Customers in Foodservice Sector.” British Food Journal, vol. 118, no. 9, 2016, pp. 2326–2343. Emerald Insight, doi: https://doi.org/10.1108/BFJ-12-2015-0460
Nakagome, Yulia. “USC Should Adopt Better Methods to Eliminate Food Waste.” Daily Trojan, 30 March 2020, https://dailytrojan.com/2020/03/30/usc-should-adopt-better-methods-to-eliminate-food-waste/. Accessed 29 November 2021.
Pratesi, Carlo A. “Reducing Food Waste: An Investigation on the Behaviour of Italian Youths.” British Food Journal, vol. 117, no. 2. Emerlad Insight, doi: https://doi.org/10.1108/BFJ-10-2013-0314
