Boy holding tongs with lettuce in cafeteria line

Guest Post: 2016 Food Waste & Hunger Summit

Americans waste 40% of food, or roughly 133 billion pounds every year in the United States. On average, each of us wastes 15 to 20% of our own food each year. While terrifying quantities of food go uneaten every day, one in six Americans don’t know where their next meal will come from. Of these Americans, 16 million of them are hungry children. Children are going hungry and we could be feeding them with the billions of pounds of healthy food being thrown away.

The Campus Kitchens Project works to divert wasted food to feed hungry adults and children. Since 2001, we’ve recovered millions of pounds of food – food that would have otherwise been thrown away – and created over 2.5 million meals.

Each spring, The Campus Kitchens Project (CKP) hosts a Food Waste & Hunger Summit in partnership with leading national nonprofit organizations. The Summit brings together professionals and students to share best practices for fighting food waste and hunger in their communities. It provides an opportunity to learn from experts in the fields of social justice, social enterprise, public health, non-profit management and related fields.

Take action in fighting food waste and hunger by joining us at the third annual Food Waste & Hunger Summit to share your ideas on the food waste and hunger relief movement. Click here to pre-register and be notified when registration opens. We also encourage you to submit a proposal to speak at Summit. Nonprofit leaders, advocates, and students are encouraged to apply with proposals across the spectrum of food waste, hunger, and poverty solutions.

The 2016 Food Waste & Hunger Summit will take place April 16-17 in Fayetteville, AR at the University of Arkansas.  Keynote speakers will include Rebecca Vallas, the Director of Policy for the Poverty to Prosperity Program at The Center for American Progress, and Robert Egger, President and Founder of L.A. Kitchen. To pre-register for the event, submit a speaking proposal, or to learn more about the 2016 Food Waste & Hunger Summit, click here.