Feeding the 5K for free; Raising Awareness of unwanted food waste

I found out about Feeding the 5K event held at Trafalgar Square in London on the 16th December 2009, from someone who invited me to attend the lunch. I found this event to be the perfect opportunity to offer my service and help increase awareness on the levels of food wasted everyday! As the title suggests feeding the 5K is exactly that, a free lunch made of unwanted food waste served to 5,000 people for free.

Interview with Tristram Stuart at Trafalgar Square, 16th December about Feeding the 5,000

This event came about by Tristram Stuart, an individual passionate about agriculture and the natural means of living and raising awareness on the facts of today’s globalised modern food production! The main idea behind the event was to highlight the levels of good food going to waste by not fitting Supermarket’s criteria of perfect looking food, and to show that we as consumers are throwing nearly as much good food away as the Supermarket.

Almost 50% of all food grown in the UK is wasted, with UK households throwing away 25% of the food they buy Source: Jo Caird, 2009, http://se7enmagazine.com/the-issue/39-europe/807-feeding-the-5000-and-saving-the-world-.html, Se7nmagazine.com

By organising such event which places emphasis on the reality of the dominance and control that Supermarkets have on the current food production and how it can manipulate people’s perception as well as our own intake and consumption of food, it shows us what is really going on and how easily humans are conditioned. The free lunch gave the public the opportunity to taste this unwanted food, that didn’t make it to the Supermarket shelfs. The food of all shapes and sizes was rescued by wholesalers and given by local farmers.

One can imagine the overall impact this is making on a global scale and that there needs to be something done about it. By bringing this insight forward as a collective, the raised awareness in society becomes ever more important in the change for reduction.

The day as a volunteer was wonderful and truly enjoyable. It was a brilliant way to connect and engage with others in raising awareness and making a positive impact. My volunteering experience started early as I handed out flyers around the area of Trafalgar Square, and it was so nice to meet new people and see that these strangers were as equally passionate about the issue as I and the campaigners at the event. Some restaurant staff even took a wodge of flyers to put on their restaurant tables, as they knew exactly how much good food went to waste in their own restaurant everyday and felt it was an unreasonable thing to do, but they couldn’t help change that.

I find it inspirational that some restaurants have the willingness and good will to give away most of their unwanted food to homeless people. There is even an organisation in the UK called FareShare who make use of good food wasted by distributing the food to vulnerable groups and people, who aren’t otherwise able to afford it or don’t have the means to access food.

Volunteers serving lunch

My second half of the day consisted in informing indidivuals about the separation of litter from the free lunch. There was a composting bin for the wooden cutlery, leftover food and any other materials from the event put into this bin and a regular bin for other litter from other sources such as plastic, cardboard etc put here. I stood by the food tent at all times during this shift. It was lovely to see everyone radiating in cue, whilst waiting for their food. Even though the food was free, there felt to be a greater connection between everyone as a valuable message was reached. Posivite vibes were had all round, and even dancing commenced among people, to a very lively Hare Krishna tribute band under the freezing conditions of a snow fall in Trafalgar Square, on the Wednesday 16th December.

: The public dancing with the Hare Krishnas

Thank you to all those that organised and helped with the event, those that supported us all volunteers, and all those people that came on down for the free lunch. You all are what made this event shine.