HOW THE CURRENT GENERATION IS ADDRESSING CANADA’S FOOD WASTE PROBLEM: DAVID SCHEIN...

BY JIYOON HA   Food waste is a mounting, $31 billion problem in Canada, and a problem that’s happening at every level: grocery stores, restaurants, farms, and most notably, households. Because it’s an issue so widespread across the nation, but happening in the unseen pockets of the food industry, it’s often glossed over as an issue too big to tackle by the government.   On an individual scale, this pressing issue smothers us with a feeling of simultaneous guilt and helplessness. Sure, we should work towards reducing our own food waste — after all, homes contribute to 50% of food waste — but with our increasingly fast-paced lifestyles, it’s difficult to exact the science of reducing our own food waste through frequent shopping for smaller quantities. Even if we can reserve a sliver of our daily lives for the supermarket to take on the zero-waste lifestyle, large figures, like $31 billion or 1.5 billion of overall food waste in Canada, can make it feel like our own individual dedication to saving the environment isn’t even making a dent of a dent. Photo courtesy of Food Stash Foundation   One early Friday morning, I met with David Schein, the founder of Food Stash Foundation. Food Stash has a truly remarkable story: what began as a one person project, consisting of David and his trusty bicycle — and eventually, a Toyota Camry, has evolved into a full-fledged organization with committed volunteers, twenty-six food rescue organizations, over forty (and counting) food suppliers, and has recently achieved charity status — all over the course of ten months. According to their website, Food Stash has a “two-fold mission”: to “rescue food from producers and suppliers that would have been destined for the landfill, and to deliver edible food items...