The second edition of the NYC Food Waste Fair is slated for later this month in Brooklyn. On May 23rd the NYC Department of Sanitation’s non-profit affiliate, the Foundation for New York’s Strongest, will welcome chefs, restaurant operators, grocery store owners, and street vendors to the event at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
The inaugural event, held in 2017, enabled food service professionals to join forces with the City of New York to learn ways to solve the social and environmental issues of food waste. It opened the eyes to many in the industry with strategies to profit from the recovery and reuse of food waste. The upcoming NYC Food Waste Fair will also benefit from the addition of a true food waste visionary. The Foundation has recently welcomed Julie Raskin as incoming Executive Director.
“I am so excited to join the city again at the Department of Sanitation which is doing some truly innovative things right now in waste reduction. This fair also gives us a great opportunity to respond to a strong appetite to partner with the private sector,” added Raskin.
Raskin is teaming with the Department’s Deputy Chief of Staff, Monika Wysocki, who was instrumental in the vision and creation of the event. “One-third of all the food produced for human consumption doesn’t actually end up being eaten as intended,” Wysocki noted. “Instead, it ends up rotting in landfills and producing harmful methane emissions. The Food Waste Fair exists to help stop that problem of food being wasted and not being used for the highest possible use.”
One of the Food Waste Fair’s true breakthroughs has been its ability to illustrate how one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. The opportunity has never been greater to recover and reuse food responsibly and profitably. “The food waste fair mission is to connect businesses with the solutions they need to solve this problem,” added Wysocki. “Our goal is to present solutions for focusing on prevention and recovery and what else to do when recycling options simply don’t make sense.”
Among Raskin’s priorities for this year’s fair is to launch an education track that will highlight the latest techniques and technologies from the foremost experts in the field. These workshops will share strategies to develop a more sustainable food system and means for using data to drive food waste reduction and more. “One of the things that is critical to realize is that this is a sector where profit margins are notoriously thin and in our conversations with chef operators and caterers we constantly hear about the struggle of operating a foodservice business in New York City,” Raskin noted. “So our workshops will highlight specific food waste prevention strategies that can help save money for your business,” said Raskin. The Fair will host three tracks of workshops this year for professional chefs, food establishment operators and sustainability advocates. “Our goal is for any attendee to be stimulated by an immersive experience to build the skills that they need to go back to their kitchens to be able to implement new practices.”
The upcoming Brooklyn event also presents a unique opportunity for the vendor community. “We welcome exhibitors that provide New York City businesses with service, guidance and solutions that they need to start and then grow their food waste management strategies to meet New York City regulations,” Wysocki outlined. “There’s a lot of really innovative work going on in technology in terms of inventory tracking systems. Many of our vendors at the Fair will offer solutions that will facilitate smarter procurement decisions to reduce what will become waste before it even comes in a restaurant’s door. From tracking analytics to waste auditors, more applications and online platforms are being launched which benefit retailers and consumers.”
The 2019 NYC Food Waste Fair has set its sights on embracing innovative strategies and setting a new precedent for reducing food waste in NYC. For more information on exhibiting or attending, please visit their website.
