On Monday 22nd March, Foodprint was part of the inaugural New Zealand Food Summit in Auckland. The event was a result of hard work by WasteMINZ supported by the NZ Food Waste Champions 12.3. Representatives from charities, waste removal, government, universities, supermarkets, and food re-distributors made up the 150 attendees covering many elements of the food sector.
The summit’s theme of Paddock to Plate allowed us to hear speakers from across the food sector including academics, grocery, industry, government, mātauranga Māori and food rescue organisations. They spoke to different parts of Aotearoa’s food chain (paddock, packhouse, presentation, and plate) followed by panel discussions and workshops on each topic.
Miranda Mirosa, Associate Professor, Consumer Food Science at University of Otago
The event was opened by Labour List MP and food waste advocate Angie Warren-Clark. She shared her previous work with Domestic Violence survivors and Women’s Refuge and her experience of working with food rescue organisations in the Bay of Plenty to help feed those in their safehouses. She acknowledged that we need to work to fix our broken food systems.
A highlight was keynote speaker Dana Gunders from ReFED sharing insights on the importance of data to determine the most impactful changes we can make. It was also great to hear local examples of how people are repurposing food that would traditionally be wasted such as Lionel Hotene speaking about Kai Ika and Hannah Miller Childs speaking about her business A Lady Butcher.
Citizen was also attending and showcased their upcycled beers which are created using surplus bread, the leftover grains from this beer are then used again to create further loaves of fresh bread! We can highly recommend, both the bread and the beer!
We can’t wait to see what learnings came out of the day and what the final Food Waste Reduction Roadmap looks like when it’s released in April.