A Journey to One Million Pounds

This year FRN launched a partnership with The FarmLink Project (FarmLink), a student-led organization that has rescued millions of pounds of surplus food from farms during the pandemic. FarmLink saw a need and an opportunity to mitigate farm food loss as dining facilities closed down in April, and FRN recognized our own power to help in the process.

FRN volunteer efforts led to the recovery and distribution of 38,000 pounds of celery in September.

FRN’s Intersection to this Work

Many FRN Student Chapters have been unable to recover surplus food from their campuses this year. At the same time, the massive shift to virtual life has opened up new possibilities when it comes to volunteering. With an estimated 54 million Americans experiencing food insecurity, FRN recognized the urgent need to activate our students and alumni to continue fighting food waste. 

In September, 120 FRN students and alumni mobilized to identify opportunities for food recovery on farms, enabling FarmLink to intervene before any food went to waste. In this way, our students and alumni are using their experience, skills, and passion for food recovery to address the current needs of farmers and food insecure communities across the country. In the process, they are also gaining valuable knowledge surrounding farm food loss and waste and developing skills to initiate the recovery and distribution of food on a large scale. 

“I think this is an incredible learning opportunity that is constantly pushing me and teaching me that any idea could be turned into an action - all it takes is belief, drive and a few committed people. FarmLink is continuously maturing in its intentions and my specific role on the farms team has made me more confident in both the skill of cold-calling and trusting that the community of volunteers is there for the farmers and volunteers at every step.” - FRN Alumna

FRN’s volunteer engagement 

Our work has already resulted in the recovery of 450,000 pounds of food. Aside from the research and outreach, FRN volunteers are taking on leadership roles with FarmLink and energizing others to dive into the work. This partnership combines the strengths of our network with FarmLink’s logistical and tactical prowess to achieve maximum impact. 

FRN volunteers continue to identify food recovery opportunities before the fall harvest season ends.

"The FarmLink Project has been so lucky to have the help of FRN members as we continue to grow our organization. The first group of FRN members began working hand in hand with us when we had just crossed the 5 million pound mark and now with The FarmLink Project approaching 15 million pounds, we can use all the help we can get with the next 15 million." - Cooper Adams, Head of Farms Team at FarmLink

If you’re feeling inspired by this work, sign up to volunteer! Now is the time to take action. With your help, FRN and FarmLink can recover one million pounds of food before the end of the year.

Result: Recover Surplus Food to Feed Everyone Who is Hungry in the U.S.

Throughout late July, FRN’s Chief Operating Officer, Katie Jones and I conducted five public Roundtable Talks with a variety of FRN stakeholders to discuss our new strategic framework. The framework is a blueprint for how FRN plans to recover surplus food to feed everyone who is hungry in the U.S. This is no small task and while FRN outlines the roles we can play in this critical work, we also understand we are one agent of several organizations necessary to accomplish this goal. The framework details how FRN plans to continue our bedrock work--the work we’ve always done to feed those who are hungry in the United States with recovered food, and how we will in concert with that work, get underneath the pervasive mechanisms of economic ills that ensure so many millions of people each year must rely on food assistance to get by.

The conversations with our community were inspiring, illuminating, and at times, overwhelming because of the sheer complexity of the issue. Katie and I have outlines our key takeaways from these conversations as a way to condense the valuable information that came from these talks, and I will say, one of the most overwhelming takeaways we heard from current student leaders, alums, dining providers, funders, our partner agencies who receive our donated food and our National Board of Directors? FRN needs to step forward in this way to do this work. FRN is ready.

Katie

What struck me: How much people value this community. Particularly in the pandemic, I think people desire connection and our network facilitates them connecting with people that share a common passion, which is critical right now—recovering food to feed people who are experiencing hunger.  

What I’m most excited about: Sharing our learning in real-time with our stakeholders. We have ambitious goals for this year, a year when our work is most critical, and I am curious to see how our work goes and share what we learned and how that will change our work moving forward.

Regina

 What struck me: Despite the hardship of the pandemic, people remain committed to helping. Our stakeholders see the shifts we outlined in our framework as critical to supporting a better food system once the pandemic is over. More than ever we have the momentum and expertise to make permanent improvements throughout the food system that won’t breakdown when system disruptions occur—because we know they will occur.

What I’m most excited about: Increasing the communication networks across all of our stakeholders to accomplish this vision of now, and our longer-term vision of dismantling the systems that cause people to not have enough food in the first place when our country produces more than enough, and building in its place, a just and equitable food system that is inclusive of everyone. It’s very intimidating to be so transparent about our work and by offering this very quick feedback loop for everyone to respond to, but this is exactly how we can get to a better food system on the other side of the pandemic and I’m excited that so many people remain in the corner of FRN to make that happen.

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Takeaways

• Stakeholders appreciate a holistic approach to our work which is a strategic shift for us.

• People agree that the work of feeding all people who are food insecure with surplus food feels right.

• The strategic framework is exciting to people and we are moving in the right direction.

• The systems change work of workforce development, advocacy is exciting to people and they want to be more involved with the creation of this intentional work.

• Stakeholders are curious about our workforce development work, but it is still nascent so we need more dialogue with partners to make sure we are building the curriculum to ensure it fits emerging business needs.

• FRN is committed to better understanding positive unintentional outcomes, but we need to remain vigilant to unintended consequences which is why we are creating a rapid feedback loop that is transparent to our stakeholders. This feedback loop and progress updates will help FRN learn faster, make changes quicker, and stay the course.

• Our students and alums are committed more than ever despite the pandemic.

• Racial equity has always been part of FRN’s work and this new strategic framework is a way to codify it, through the use of disaggregated data and focusing the effort of our work in new ways.

You can listen to a Roundtable Talk where Katie and I outline the strategic framework and several takeaways.

An 8-Year-Old’s Coming of Age Story as Perspective into Current Racial Uprising

A glimpse into my past.

I’m often asked about my leadership style, my career path and what led me to want to join Food Recovery Network. It might sound cliche, but I am always truly humbled when people ask me about my journey. I’m humbled to just first and foremost interact with curious people because I carry around in my brain a lot of questions about everything, to have similar questions posed to me is just, well, humbling.

The reason I’ve chosen to share now.

In light of the current racial reckoning, it’s also been humbling that, given my particular lived experience and educational background, that people are inquiring about my leadership experience within the two identifiers that I speak to very often: being a woman and a person of color. (Being from New England is another identifier that I present very strongly as well.)

The current moment and the curiosity of others about my path is what compelled me to release a few blog posts that focus on the experiences that shaped my thinking around leadership that correspond with my 5-year anniversary at Food Recovery Network. I hope you enjoy getting to know me a bit more, and I hope we can discuss any of these topics during many of the upcoming Roundtable Talks FRN will host!

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Part 1

By Regina Anderson, executive director of Food Recovery Network

I had just turned 8 years old when my family moved from Northern Massachusetts to Central Maine. I remember one very specific moment of my first introduction to the classroom of third grade students. A defining moment. Picture the stereotypical scenario of the new kid, escorted by an adult, walking into a classroom of students engaged in any number of activities. 

The teacher or vice principal gently pushes the student into the room as they say, “everyone meet so and so, your new classmate.” For me, in my new kid moment, after the introduction, someone in the room snickered. In an instant, a major coming of age moment occurred. Up until that point, what had been an unknown, unconscious, unarticulated set of experiences, inchoate comprehensions solidified into an understanding that had never fully expressed itself before.

In this instant, with that snicker, my brain took stock of several things at once and articulated back to me the following: that snicker may have been just a not-so-welcomed response to the new kid, because while I had never experienced being the new kid, I’d been in situations where a new kid was introduced and I understood how that might feel. 

My brain understood that coming from Massachusetts to Maine, standing before everyone in full view, that my style of dress (if you can call how we dress at such a young age “style”) was so different from everyone else’s. But, my brain landed on one thing in particular: that most likely, that snicker was produced in response to my skin color.

And in my life, my skin color had never occurred to me before, but was now in stark display, revealed by that snicker. I knew it wasn’t about anything except that. Now, of course, there is no way of definitively saying if that was what was really going on. This particular kind of memory is not provable to be true or false, just that it happened, and that it mattered to me in the coming of age moment that was the first time in my life I felt like an “other.”

And, that memory, like the other ones I had already collected before it, would collect after it to create a whole host of human experiences are a large part shaping the person I am today.

FRN Raises $3,450 for Hunger-Fighting Nonprofits Impacted by COVID-19

One of my favorite quotes of all time was shared by the inspirational leader, Helen Keller: "Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much." We here at FRN have witnessed firsthand the outcomes of creating a movement through collaboration and relationship-building. That is why, especially during these times of adversity and action, we believe in uplifting organizations and partners in this movement that seek to mitigate food waste and end hunger in this country. 

In April, FRN committed to matching up to $1,000 of donations to support three of our hunger-fighting nonprofit partners in cities across the country that have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 — our first ever donation campaign to benefit hunger-fighting partners in our network. 

From April to June, FRN and our national network collectively raised a total of $3,450 to divide equally between City Harvest in New York City, NY, Mercy Home for Boys and Girls in Chicago, IL, and Pomona Valley Christian Center in Pomona, CA.

In the coming months, each nonprofit will receive a $1,150 check from FRN and on behalf of our network to support their missions of serving those who are experiencing hunger and food insecurity, which is an increasingly large population in light of COVID-19. For context on this imminent problem in our country, Feeding America estimates nearly 54 million people, an additional 17 million compared to previous statistics, are at risk of food insecurity during the pandemic.

Generating solutions, together 

The economic crisis stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic means that rates of food insecurity are rising along with unemployment rates. Further, disruptions in food production and distribution are generating additional food waste in numerous parts of our food system. FRN’s goal is to continue to build and implement effective solutions to food waste and hunger, and we look to foster the change necessary to create just and sustainable communities. 

This work is not possible unless we activate and maintain partnerships with local hunger-fighting organizations, such as City Harvest, Mercy Home, and Pomona Valley, who continually serve their communities at risk of food insecurity. Without these partnerships, FRN wouldn’t have a place to donate the recovered food to, let alone serve our communities in need. We are continually appreciative of their partnership and service. 

This is just the beginning

Although this was FRN’s first ever campaign to monetarily support hunger-fighting nonprofits in our network, we see this as a catalyst for more engagement opportunities. Every year, when we survey the hunger-fighting partner agencies in our network, the most prominent ask is for monetary and funding support to further their programming. Through this campaign, FRN is directly assessing this need for three of our partners in the network. However, this is just the beginning. 

As a part of FRN’s new strategic framework, our first strategy is to activate and engage in strategic partnerships. Given that hunger-fighting nonprofits are so vital to the work we do each day, this campaign opens the door for bringing this group of stakeholders closer into our programming and mission. Hunger-fighting nonprofit partners are a vital piece of the FRN puzzle, and we seek to further fold in their input and ideas into our programming to achieve tangible impact and results in the fight against food waste and hunger. 

Acknowledgements

First, FRN would like to thank and acknowledge the various individual donors who donated to this campaign, your contribution to this campaign and our work is always appreciated. Additionally, we would like to thank Planetary Design as a donor in this campaign and a continual supporter of FRN’s work and programming. Finally, we would like to thank all hunger-fighting nonprofits in our network and communities who continue to support and provide resources for our neighbors at risk of hunger. We encourage our network to check out their programming and consider donating to these organizations to further their work in the fight against hunger. 

Please note that all remaining funds from the campaign will be donated to FRN to further our work to fight food waste and support communities at risk of food insecurity. If you would like to donate to FRN directly, please visit www.foodrecoverynetwork.org/donate.