FareShare: Helping to get unsold produce onto people’s plates

With huge quantities of good-to-eat vegetables, fruit and other food grown on UK farms failing to make it to the market, a new survey shines a light on redistribution practices in the fresh produce sector.

Approximately 50% of growers have given food to redistribution charities in the past like FareShare, who commissioned the survey, with another 50% never having done so.

Surplus happens for a variety of reasons and differs according to the production system.

In the fresh produce sector demand fluctuates depending on customer need and is affected by unpredictable factors including the weather. Often there is surplus produce in the field which, when harvested, is still good to eat.

FareShare, the UK’s largest charity fighting hunger and food waste, works with farmers to redistribute their surplus food to charities.

Defra is supporting these efforts in England through the Tackling Food Surplus at the Farm Gate scheme.

FareShare commissioned the survey as part of that Defra grant funding to understand the problem, and to encourage more farmers with surplus food to redistribute it.

The results are enlightening, not just providing a snapshot of attitudes to redistribution, but the volume of produce that doesn’t make it from the farm for human consumption.

Surplus produce

Just from the farmers that answered the survey, they had enough good-to-eat surplus produce that was suitable to redistribute to provide an estimated 2.6 million meals.

Currently growers deal with this excess in a multitude of ways. Approximately half of farmers use surplus produce for animal feed, with 40% ploughing it back into the land.

Around 10% use it as a feedstock for anaerobic digestion (AD) and 3% dispose of it into landfill.

40% said they currently donate their surplus to food redistribution charities, which demonstrates a willingness amongst the fresh produce sector to see surplus go to people in need as opposed to other destinations.

One farming business which has donated a significant amount of surplus is G’s, which grows celery, iceberg lettuce, mushrooms, beetroot, radishes, baby leaf salad, onions, spring onions and other vegetables in East Anglia, on the south coast and in the West Midlands as well as overseas.

G’s is a prime example of how the business and charity sector is working together to redistribute surplus food in England, supported by the Tackling Food Surplus at the Farm Gate.

This scheme strengthens links between farms and charities to help solve the problem of food surplus on farms, with grants totaling £13.5 million having been offered to 11 food charities across England.

Barriers to donating

But with 50% of farmers surveyed by Farmers Weekly never having passed on surplus in this way, what are the barriers?

For some, the answer is simple – they can feed it to their animals. But the picture overall is a more complicated one.

Cost is the most significant barrier, associated with the transport and logistics of passing on that surplus, and harvesting and labour.

So too is produce having a short shelf life and farmers having little space to store it ahead of collection.

Farmers also fear that by giving surplus away, they will potentially lose income from selling to anaerobic digestion and/or animal feed. 

There are time and admin challenges which growers associate with redistribution too.

Other issues raised included concerns about food safety and potential liability, but for 31% it was just because they didn’t know how to do it.

FareShare’s CEO Kris Gibbon Walsh says the survey reveals many issues, principally how much food is going to waste unnecessarily.

“Huge amounts of fresh, healthy, British food that could feed people ends up going to animals, or ploughed back into the soil,’’ he says.

Good food is essential for positive mental and physical health, for children to succeed at school, and for adults to perform at work, he adds.

“This surplus food presents a real opportunity to change lives for the better, which we can do by redistributing it to charities across the UK.

“FareShare and our partners at The Felix Project work with 8000 charities in communities everywhere that do all manner of great things; breakfast clubs for kids, dinners for the elderly, food pantries, churches, and organisations like domestic violence shelters.

“But we still have charities on our waiting lists, which is why it’s key to get more surplus to people who need it.’’

Kris points to the main barrier farmers cite in this survey for not redistributing surplus – the cost of transport and logistics.

“This is why schemes like FareShare’s Surplus with Purpose, partially supported this year in England through Defra’s Tackling Food Surplus at the Farm Gate, are so important,’’ he says.

“It’s vital that businesses, charities and government work together to make sure the food waste hierarchy is followed and to move towards a sustainable and resilient food supply where waste is reduced in line with the recently published Food Strategy for England”.

Surplus with Purpose fund

G’s often provides its surplus free of charge but has also tapped into FareShare’s Surplus with Purpose (SWP), a fund for businesses in the fresh produce sector that helps cover the extra costs of redistributing unsold food to people who need it and preparing unfinished surplus food for redistribution.

The fund has covered G’s costs of harvesting unsold vegetables, produce that may otherwise have been ploughed back into fields.

The relationship with FareShare has brought increased focus into G’s operations, by identifying and unlocking hotspots where surplus occurs, which in turn has naturally reduced waste streams.

This work is in line with the government’s Food Waste Hierarchy, which prioritises preventing food waste first, then redistributing surplus to people, followed by using it for animal feed, energy recovery (like anaerobic digestion), composting, and finally disposal as a last resort.

Working with FareShare has been a positive experience for the business, says Charlotte Bowles, of G’s.

“It’s important in terms of the nutrition that we can provide to people in need and, from a business point of view, it’s positive in terms of how we’re managing our waste streams.’’