Successful failures’ the issue in food bank

They’ve since changed from ” emergency to industry” and are praised for their efforts to reduce food insecurity and help solve the issue of food waste by diverting tons of food from the landfills.

This is the ideal win-win scenario which large food companies and retailers are devoted to helping people experiencing poverty and protecting the planet in the process. This premise has been codified within the Canadian National Food Waste Reduction Strategy and also in European law, which requires retailers to donate excess food items to charitable organizations.

If we want to be determined to address the issues that lead to food insecurity, we must move away from neoliberalism and move towards a values-sensitive and inclusive economy. Suppose we want to be determined to stop food waste. In that case, we are required to make a ” paradigm shift” away from productivism to an agro-ecosystem “designed for well-being, resilience and sustainability.”

From the emergency to the industry

According to the Foodbank Australia’s 2017 Hunger Report, 625,000 Australians seek urgent food assistance each month. This is a 10 percent increase over the last twelve months.

Despite their rapid growth, food banks have not been able to meet the demand created by stagnant wages, as well as the cost of living increases along with a shrinking welfare system. They’ve been described as ” highly visible successful failures.” In addition to taking on the shoes of the state and providing the basic social security insurance plan as well as providing valuable services to food producers and retailers.

In the first place, they remove millions of tonnes of garbage from the landfill. Food donation organizations save substantial amounts in disposal fees.

In addition, donors can receive tax-deductible deductions on all food items given to food banks that are registered charitable organizations. Most importantly, donors are able to improve their social license to act as responsible corporate citizens and also receive low-cost publicity in the process.

Band-aids do not solve the problem.

In a recent research paper in the UK Food Research Collaboration, Martin Caraher and Sinead Furey conducted a cost-benefit study of existing consensus on whether food security can be best addressed through the increase in the donation of surplus food for food bank donations. Their findings were unambiguous:

While there are some benefits in diverting excess food from the garbage, the reasons for caution outweigh the arguments to be optimistic. This is due to the fact that the benefits of utilizing food waste to feed the hungry are primarily directly to food industries while removing the responsibility of the government to tackle food insecurity.

This is a particular issue in a democracy that is liberal, like Australia, which is dedicated to the concept of human rights that are universal, which includes the right to a healthy diet. Studies conducted in both Scotland and the Netherlands as well as Scotland have proven the shame, humiliation, and loss of respect suffered by those who rely on food banks.

A healthy and nutritious diet is an essential element in the right of every human being to a healthy food. The practice of feeding people food waste directly erodes the right to adequate food.

Reframe the debate

The most popular win-win strategy, which claims we can fix food insecurity by redistributing food waste to food banks, is clearly not working. Both of these phenomena are growing. In any event, indeed, a situation of food security cannot be attained through emergency food relief.

A significant breakthrough was made on the 25th of March, 2015, when the leading community food organizations and food security researchers from Canada released the Cecil Street Statement. The statement stated that food insecurity is a result of a lack of income and that the solution was having enough money to purchase quality food in a dignified manner. In addition, it said that the idea of conflating food insecurity and food waste is unhelpful and unproductive.

In Australia In Australia, the Right to Food Coalition last year, the Right to Food Coalition issued the policy statement entitled”The Human Right to Food. It contained a full set of guidelines that drew on what was done by the United Nations special rapporteur on the human right to food.