‘Food Policy Council’ to help prevent food waste in El Paso

El Paso City Council Tuesday approved a resolution to prevent food waste and established a Regional Food Policy Council. The council would be led by citizens.

The resolution declares 2017 as the “Year of Food Waste Prevention and Recovery in El Paso,” and directs city staff to develop a realistic food waste reduction strategy by 2018.

The Food Policy Council would work with grocery stores to help gather surplus produce and distribute it to those in need. The goal is for the council to expand its mission to work with restaurants and the organizers of large events serving food.

City employee Nicole Ferrini is working to make the resolution a reality.

“We really want to make sure the policy council is made up of folks that are vested in this initiative. So we are going to have folks representing agriculture, representing restaurants, representing grocers and health practitioners. Really a broad array of folks,” Ferrini said.

Americans throw away 25 percent of the food they prepare, according to the City of El Paso.

“The initial step is for us to work with grocery stores and work with produce because that really is the easiest one to deal with. Once you start getting into restaurant waste, we start getting into the issue that Rep. Limon brought up. The food has already been plated, and is it safe? So we are working with the health department to figure out how do we work better and take it to the next step with places like restaurants and big events,” Ferrini said.

The decomposition of food in landfills produces methane gas, a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide,” a city official stated in a news release. Recovery of food donations and recycling diverts organic materials from landfills and helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the city further stated.

According to a news release from the city, a Food Insecure Report released by the USDA in 2011 indicates El Paso County has more than 177,000 people who are food insecure and 85,000 of them are children. The report further states 30 percent of El Paso County residents live in “food deserts,” double the state level and triple the national level.

The city will create the food council with the help of EP Food, a local, grass-roots community group established to recover food that would otherwise go to waste.