Leftovers Foundation facilitates donations to CFB to reduce food waste

The Leftovers Foundation works with the Campus Food Bank (CFB) to provide food donations to those who need them. Reducing food waste and serving the community are the main objectives of the Leftovers Foundation, Alex Wong said.

Wong is the city co-ordinator for the Edmonton-branch of the Leftovers Foundation. The Leftovers Foundation facilitates the pickup of food donations and transports them to other organizations that might need them, according to Wong.

One of the pillars of the Leftovers Foundation is serving the community, Wong said. “For us, no donation is too small.” 

Tech-enabled donations allow for time-sensitive pickup and drop-off 

The Leftover Foundation’s donation collection and distribution is facilitated through its Rescue Food app. Volunteers are able to see all available pickups once they register on the app. 

The app will “tell them where to go, where to pick up, and where to drop off. Because [there’s] time-sensitive aspects as well. We don’t want volunteers dropping [food] off somewhere that’s closed or picking up something before it’s ready,” Wong said. 

According to Wong, “volunteers are at CFB anywhere between two to four times a week.” Many donations to the CFB are from Community Natural Foods, Little Duchess Ritchie, Doughnut Party Ritchie, and several other bakeries in the area. 

“We recognize, as an organization, that food insecurity is a huge issue amongst students. Both local as well as international students, and so we’re really proud to be partnered with [CFB],” Wong said. 

“We want to reduce food waste, that’s our number one mission,” Wong says

The two main objectives of the Leftovers Foundation are to reduce food waste and serve the community, Wong said. 

“We want to reduce food waste, that’s our number one mission. There’s also an environmental aspect to it as well because food waste is one of the leading generators of greenhouse gases in landfill[s].”

Additionally, the Leftovers Foundation collects donations through both the Rescue Food program and the Home Harvest program. 

The Rescue Food program directs volunteers to go to businesses and grocery stores to collect excess food, Wong said. 

However, the Home Harvest program facilitates donation collection from people’s backyards or community gardens, Wong said. Volunteers can sign up through the Rescue Food app to help harvest food donations and then transport them to an organization that needs them. 

“We’re able to use volunteers to pick up smaller donations that aren’t really worth the effort for large organizations to look after. But we’re still making sure that food is going to people that use it.”