Network Helps Truck Drivers Deliver Rejected Edible Food to Charities instead of Dumping in Landfills

It is a sad reality that tons of good food are classified as unsuitable before they ever reach the marketplace. Truck drivers carrying food products to grocery stores often find that the products get rejected due to cosmetic damages during transit, delays in reaching the store or clerical errors.

Rather than allowing all this food to get wasted, a program started in 2017 allows truck drivers to donate the rejected yet edible food to charity organizations.

The Food Drop program, created by the Indy Hunger Network Charity helps connects truck drivers with the nearest food bank to them. In this way, it helps the driver too in multiple ways, including saving them from having to pay landfill fees while disposing off the food, offering tax deductions for donated goods and of course, helping offload the cargo.

Initially meant to operate only in Indianapolis, the Food Drop Program was such a success that over 41,000 kilograms of edible food was donated in just the first 6 months. This led the Indy Hunger Network to expand the Food Drop Program to more food banks across the state.

The Food Drop Program

The goal behind the Indy Hunger Network was to create a coordinated system that ensured anyone who was hungry could get access to the nutritious food they need. It acknowledged that while there were many in need as well as many ready to help, individual, uncoordinated efforts was just not good enough.

The Food Drop Program isn’t their first program to help the disadvantaged either. Over the years, the Indy Hunger Network has successfully initiated and completed various programs including:

• The Outreach to Seniors Pilot helping hungry seniors in low income areas receive food assistance.
• The Glean Team in 2013, created to tackle wastage of food from field to fork, harvested excess and imperfect produce from local farms and gardens and delivered over 7,000 kilos in just one year to the needy.
• Fresh Bucks, a nutrition incentive program that provides families an option to purchase more fruits and vegetables from local farmers at lesser rates.  

www.indyhunger.org/

Author's note:

Since 2017, every year, I take up the #BlogchatterA2Z challenge and focus on showcasing lovely real-life heroes from around the world. The aim is to remind you that there is still plenty of good human beings all around you... to inspire you to smile once more.

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