Webinar: Leveraging Reporting Policies to Reduce Food Waste

Food loss and waste and food insecurity are parallel issues emerging as some of the greatest food system challenges today. While an estimated one-third of food produced for human consumption is lost or wasted, more than 735 million people around the world are hungry and 11 percent are severely food insecure.

Scaling food donation, which reduces waste and alleviates food insecurity, requires aligned incentives and sensible policy to motivate individuals and companies to donate rather than discard surplus food. Reporting interventions that require the measurement of food loss and waste streams, such as environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting; Scope 3 emissions reporting; and food waste reporting are key solutions. They can incentivize entities to target and measure their waste streams and help them identify areas where they could reduce the costs of food waste through food donation. Leveraging such laws can be a powerful tool to influence business behavior and promote more sustainable food systems.

This dialogue will reveal the potential for well-designed, implemented, and enforced food waste and emissions reporting polices to encourage greater food donation and minimize food loss and waste and its negative impacts on food insecurity, environmental damage, and climate change. This meeting offers a forum for leading stakeholders to discuss some of the best practices, challenges, and considerations of emissions, environmental, and food waste reporting.

On behalf of Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic (FLPC) and The Global FoodBanking Network (GFN), you are invited to a webinar on Leveraging Reporting Policies to Reduce Food Waste, the second of an ongoing series of virtual events highlighting barriers to food donation and the related policy solutions through our joint Global Food Donation Policy Atlas.

OPENING:

• Emily M. Broad Leib, Clinical Professor of Law and Director, Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic

Moderator: Ambassador Ertharin Cousin, Founder and CEO Food Systems for the Future; Managing Director Good Food Opportunity Fund; Distinguished Fellow Chicago Council on Global Affairs; Visiting Scholar Stanford University Center-Food Security and Environment.

Panelists:

• Brian Lipinski, Research Associate, Food Program, Word Resources Institute, USA 
• Claudia A. Sanchez Castro, National Coordinator, Pacto por la Comida, BAMX, Mexico
• Gray E. Norton, Clinical Fellow, Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic, USA
• Janelle Meyers, Chief Sustainability Officer, Kellanova
• Policy Advisor, Food Data Transparency Project, United Kingdom Dept. for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs

CLOSING:

• Douglas L. O’Brien, Vice President, Programs, The Global FoodBanking Network

The Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic will present key findings from the Atlas project and facilitate a discussion between the invited policymakers, food donors, and food recovery organizations about:

• Concerns and challenges regarding emissions, environmental, and food waste reporting policies;
• Best practices, innovative policy models, and relevant considerations for such reporting mechanisms; and
• Case study examples and policy considerations to encourage the adoption of legislation that requires emissions, environmental, or food waste reporting to reduce food waste and incentivize food recovery.

Date: May 16, 2024

Time: 9:30 am – 11:00 am ET

Register here!