That’s the message in the latest documentary from the Canadian Cattle Association, which focuses on feedlots and their role in recycling food waste.

Why it matters: Food waste takes up space in landfills and its breakdown adds methane to the atmosphere, so there’s value in feeding it to livestock instead.

“There are concerns folks have about the environment and sustainability we want to address,” said Emma Cross, CCA manager of public and stakeholder engagement.

“We’ve found over the years that, by and large, Canadians do feel good and have positive sentiments about the Canadian beef industry.”

The documentary, called Reduce, Reuse, Ruminate, was released April 24, coinciding with Stop Food Waste Day, a campaign started in 2017 by American food service umbrella company Compass Group.

The film is the third in a five-part mini-documentary series showcasing the benefits of raising Canadian beef.

Ontario producer Mike Buis of Buis Beef provided some of the film’s source material. He said the high cost of land and lack of pasture prodded him to look for affordable alternative feed sources, whether that was grazing his cattle on corn stalks or partnering with local processors.

Buis said there were lessons to learn as an early adopter. For example, the cattle loved onions, but their meat was infused with a slight onion flavour and aroma. Carrots, which are 90 per cent water, gave the fat a slightly yellow hue and didn’t provide sufficient nutrients.

“We take our feeds very seriously. We pull samples and analyze them,” Buis said. “Then, we run them through our computer programs and make sure we have all the essential nutrients and everything we need to make sure our cattle grow properly.”

Buis has fed chopped rye, ear corn and soy hull from his operation, as well as sweet potato peelings from a fry processor, sweet corn husks and ear discards from a sweet corn processing facility and brewers’ grain from Labatt’s Brewery in London.

“In the documentary, we talk specifically about feed regulations created by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, as well as working with nutritionists to ensure that any of these byproducts are a part of a balanced diet for cattle,” said Cross.

Ryan Kasko, a producer from Coaldale, Alta., discussed one year’s decision to feed 50,000 tonnes of raw french fries to cattle at one of his feedlots.

Bob Lowe of Bear Trap Feeders in Nanton, Alta., said he never imagined feeding dragon fruit to cattle, but now he has seen it.

“It’s perfectly edible food that, for one reason or another, consumers don’t like the look of it,” said Lowe in the documentary.

While consumers may balk at a blemished apple or a crooked carrot, visual appeal isn’t critical to cattle. Nutritional quality is the measure, said Buis. And food safety for cattle doesn’t extend to produce that falls on the floor during processing, as it would for human consumption.

“We’re not concerned if there’s a bit of dirt on it.”

Buis said the documentary shares two equally important aspects of cattle production: the essential role of cattle in the sustainable, regenerative agriculture movement and the importance of producers being open to lower-cost feed alternatives that will assure long-term beef production.

Like previous documentaries, Guardians of the Grasslands and Too Close to Home, the new Reduce, Reuse Ruminate presentation spent time on the film festival circuit and garnered feedback before local screenings were scheduled.

WILDsound Feedback Film Festival reviews said the documentary provided a balanced, hopeful approach that didn’t talk down to the audience, while giving strong graphics and information on the supply chain and upcycling solutions to combat food waste.

Many viewers noted that, while they were aware of food waste, loss and food insecurity, they hadn’t given much thought to the greenhouse gas production of food diverted to landfills.

Amanda Brodhagen, an Ontario beef producer, said the documentary highlights the multi-faceted impact of food loss and waste and how its use by cattle creates a secondary landfill benefit. She’s also a councillor in her local government, so she understands the landfill challenge.

The average person doesn’t ponder the lifespan of a landfill site, especially the sliding scale formula in which life expectancy declines as community growth accelerates.

Brodhagen said 58 per cent of food produced in Canada goes to waste, about 40 per cent of that occurring at the retail and consumer levels, so partnerships between feedlot producers and processors can divert waste, provide affordable cattle feed alternatives and lower business disposal costs.

– Diana Martin is a reporter for Farmtario.

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Of all household food items that end up in the trash, vegetables represent 30 per cent of total food waste by weight, while fruits come in at 15 per cent, according to anti-food waste website LoveFoodHateWaste.ca.

The site, operated by the National Zero Waste Council, claims that Canadians throw out 1.3 million apples, 2.6 million potatoes and 1.3 million tomatoes every day.

Lovemore Malunga, an Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada scientist in Winnipeg, is working on a way to reduce those numbers, and part of the answer might lie inside oat groats.

“We’re working with the fruit growers to see if we can use oat starch as a coating … to coat the fruits,” said Malunga.

His work explores the functional and nutritional properties of pulse crops and cereals, and includes a project that creates a kind of biofilm based on oat starch. The hope is that the coating could extend the shelf life of produce.

Edible starch, like that found in oats, is a moisture barrier, forming an almost waxy coating that keeps fruit from rotting. Instead of fruit lasting one week, “it could potentially last two weeks,” Malunga said.

It could be sprayed on, although baths in which fruit is washed in the oat starch formulation is another option.

The concept is appealing, since oat starch is safe for human consumption and could replace plastic used to preserve fruit and vegetables. However, it is a long way from commercialization.

AAFC scientists in Nova Scotia have also been testing the preservative powers of the oat starch formulation on fruit and berries.

“We are waiting to hear, good or bad,” Malunga said.

“Theoretically, it should work … This is the first formulation. There is still room for improvement.”

Malunga’s research is one project among many that seek new ways to preserve produce and cut food waste — a topic that garners attention for both food security and environmental reasons.

Last year, a group of Spanish food scientists published a literature review on edible coatings.

“The need for food waste reduction, the consumers’ interest in incorporating more fresh products in their diet and the awareness of society about the environment are … why edible coatings are receiving so much interest from the scientific community,” they wrote in a paper published at mdpi.com.

Some companies are already selling coatings that protect fruit and vegetables.

Apeel from California has developed a coating derived from plant oils. The company says it acts like another layer of peel to the fruit or vegetable.

“Our plant-based protection slows water loss and oxidation, the primary causes of spoilage,” says its website.

Greenhouse growers in Ontario started experimenting with Apeel’s technology in 2022 to replace the plastic wrap typically covering English cucumbers.

Dino Di Laudo of Topline Farms in Leamington, Ont., told CTV News that it was testing the coating and shipping Apeel-treated cucumbers to 12 grocery stores in Toronto.

“I’m hopeful that within two or three years that this will be the norm for cucumbers,” he told the news channel at the time.

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I’ve just pulled some sliced chicken out of the fridge to make some sandwiches. I notice the chicken is within its use-by date, but I’m still suspicious. Another member of the family has unlovingly ripped open the packaging and the slices have been sitting exposed in the fridge for several days.

Wondering if the chicken is still usable, I give it a good sniff, hoping for some evidence that it is still good or has gone off.

I should know better because I’m a microbiologist and I know the microbes that I might be worried about making me sick have no smell. Yet, there I am, trying and failing to give myself confidence with the old sniff test.

It’s certainly true that some microbes create odours when they are growing. Favourites include the lovely smell of yeast in freshly risen or baked bread, which is in stark contrast to – and please excuse the toilet humour – the aversion we all have to the gaseous concoctions created by our own bodies’ microbes that come in the form of flatulence or bad breath.

These gases arise when microbial populations are growing and becoming abundant – when the metabolism of each microbial resident converts carbon and other elements into sources of energy or building blocks for their own cellular structure.

However, the microbes most commonly associated with foodborne illness, such as listeria and salmonella, are nearly impossible to pick up with the sniff test.

Even if present – and the risk is thankfully relatively low – these bacteria would probably be at such a small amount in the food that any metabolic action (and then odour production) would be entirely imperceptible to our noses.

Also, any “eau de listeria” would be indistinguishable from the minor odours made by more abundant microbial species that are common and expected to be on our foods, and which cause us no health concerns.

Yes, there’s a very small chance that listeria may be present in the smoked salmon that I picked up at the coastal smokehouse last week. But absolutely no chance that my olfactory senses can detect any hints of listeria over the delicious smells of the dill and salts and smoke that make up the product.

Back to my sandwich construction. There’s even less of a chance of smelling any salmonella on the tomato that I dug from the fruit and veggie drawer in the fridge, even if I had super salmonella-smelling powers, which I don’t.

If this pathogen was on the tomato, it was probably introduced by contaminated water on the farm while the tomato was growing, so it is not on the surface, but within the tomato and doubly impossible to smell.

It is possible to detect when food is spoiled – another action of microbes, as they eat away at food that has been left too long or in the wrong storage conditions.

This is one reason why a more appropriate use of the sniff test is to suss out spoiled milk and help limit food waste, rather than throw out milk that might otherwise be safe. And for some foods – think of the microbial contribution to the finest cheeses – it is a culinary attribute to be malodorous.

While my wife disagrees with the aromatic attributes of some fermented foods (such as kimchi) and has banned them from the house, these are definitely not spoiled and should not be destined for the bin.

For other foods, such as fresh fruits or vegetables or milk, I still pay heed to any odours suggestive of spoilage and take these as a warning to do a better job of storing that particular food type in the future, or to make less or buy less if I’m not eating it in time.

I also reflect that some causes of foodborne illness are still unknown to us. While many cases of illness are caused by bacterial contaminants such as campylobacter or the other microbes I’ve mentioned, there are just as many cases where we don’t yet know the source.

But we’re getting better at this too, as scientists create tools much more accurate than our nose at detecting foodborne pathogens.

So, if I’m ever worried about becoming sick from my food, my energies are best spent on storing them at the right temperature and cooking them for the right amount of time rather than trusting my nose to sniff out a pathogen.

I wouldn’t even trust my nose to tell the difference between a cabernet and shiraz, let alone campylobacter and salmonella.

– Matthew Gilmour is a Group Leader in the ‘Microbes in the Food Chain’ programme at the Quadram Institute Bioscience. This article first appeared in the Conversation, by Reuters.

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That video has now been viewed by almost 3 million people. It shocked many Canadians, who were wondering why this is even possible when food prices are skyrocketing at the grocery store.

The dairy industry has its reasons. Supply management allows 9,500 dairy farmers to produce what we need as a country. The system is highly protected with import tariffs, and the Canadian Dairy Commission sets an appropriate price for farm milk, so farmers can make a decent living.

But dairy cows cannot magically start and stop making milk and butter fat. It just doesn’t work that way. So, most farmers will overshoot to hit their quota. Feed, the weather, and many other factors influence milk production – most Canadians can appreciate that.

Based on rough estimates, it is believed Canadian dairy farmers can dump up to 300 million litres a year in Canada. We asked the Canadian Dairy Commission for exact figures on the amount of milk dumped, and they could not say, which is a problem in and of itself. Since the dairy industry is self-regulated but highly protected by public policy, the Commission, a crown corporation, ought to know. But transparency is hardly the dairy sector’s strong point.

In Ontario, an amendment to ‘By-Laws for Marketing Boards’ under the Milk Act was made last fall, allowing the Dairy Farmers of Ontario (DFO) to “list and maintain the confidentiality of commercially sensitive DFO board documents.” Similar rules affect other dairy boards across the country. The DFO did disclose the amount of wasted farm milk prior to 2022. Moving forward, that is highly unlikely to happen again.

Now, as usual, dairy advocates were quick to go on the defensive, in an attempt to trivialize the issue of milk waste on the farm. The Dairy Farmers of Canada are always ready to send marching orders to those affiliated with Canada’s dairy practices. Their message always implies supporting the status quo, without saying so directly. They did the same with the “Buttergate” scandal in 2021 when it was disclosed that dairy farmers were using palm oil derivatives to feed cows, making butter harder. And they are doing it again, normalizing what is seen as completely unacceptable for Canadian consumers and taxpayers.

Milk dumping remains a highly taboo subject matter within the industry which is why dairy boards do everything they possibly can to silence people and make embarrassing stories go away. It shows the true dark side of supply management, the system farmers care very much about.

What is being missed in this debate is how supply management can actually eliminate all waste as the quota system can be used to our own advantage. Producing food only to destroy it makes no sense, especially with looming emission targets. Most dairy farmers around the world do discard milk occasionally. But Canada has the perfect system in place to eliminate all waste.

Firstly, we need to make milk dumping illegal. This policy shift will provide an incentive for farmers to adjust. Right now, dumping is the easiest thing to do. Making it illegal would force marketing boards to find a market for the surplus.

Secondly, the CDC should create a strategic reserve for milk, or powdered milk. Most Canadians aren’t aware that we already have a strategic reserve for butter, which includes over 85,000 kilos. Such a buffer could help between processing and shipping to markets abroad. And finally, we need processing plants.

Canadian dairy farmers have often argued that we can’t ship Canadian milk abroad, that is until China decided to build its own plant in Kingston Ontario, called Canadian Royal Milk. That’s right, Ontario dairy farmers are supplying this Chinese-owned plant to produce baby formula, and all its products are shipped to China. We can certainly do this ourselves. All we need is to create an incentive for change.

Change for the better is possible. The first step in fixing a problem is to recognize that we have one. Meanwhile though, many dairy advocates and academics will continue to normalize the issue of milk dumping by calling farmers like Jerry Huigen incompetent, foolish, and irresponsible. We also have zero publicly available data about farm milk waste, as we continue to pay more for milk and dairy products at the grocery store.

Huigen, with his 43 years of experience as a dairy farmer, has now delivered what Canadians deserve from the industry. Courage, transparency, accountability.

This is what we need, now more than ever so we make supply management work for farmers and Canadians.

– Sylvain Charlebois is professor of food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University as senior director at the Agri-Food Analytics Lab.

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Pamela Kolochuk, CEO of the vegetable marketer, said the company has an internal policy where no food goes in the garbage. Instead, Peak of the Market has developed a network of charitable avenues to use up unsold produce, and alternative endpoints for produce no longer fit for human consumption.

“We’re donating product that doesn’t meet retail specs,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with it, other than it’s ugly or it’s misshapen. Unfortunately, the food industry in Canada is very pretentious. Consumers are very pretentious. Everything has to be perfect.

“If you grow a garden, most of the potatoes you grow in your garden would never (be accepted for) retail shelves,” she added.

The policy means that millions of tonnes of product every year go to organizations such as Second Harvest, a food recovery network that diverts produce from the landfill. The network sources excess food from distributors, producers, hotels, restaurants and grocers, and redistributes it through local charities and non-profits working with Second Harvest.

The organization’s website states that 53 million pounds of food worth $185 million has been redistributed through its programs.

The need

Demand at Harvest Manitoba, which supports 360 food banks across the province, is at an all-time high due to double-digit food inflation and other financial stresses, the organization has said. Its most recent survey results found that demand at Harvest Manitoba food banks had approximately doubled since 2019.

Earlier this year, Food Banks Canada also reported that visits to food banks nationwide had sharply risen. As of March, visits were up 15 per cent from the previous year.

While food banks are running flat out, numbers released in 2019 by Second Harvest suggest that 58 per cent of the food produced in Canada at that time never made it into consumers’ stomachs.

That report, based on a year-long research project with Value Chain Management International, found about 32 per cent of the waste was avoidable. That amounted to about 11.2 million tonnes of food, 56.5 million tonnes of equivalent carbon emissions and a cost just under $50 billion annually.

“That annual cost of FWL [food waste and loss] in Canada equals three per cent of Canada’s 2016 GDP and could feed every person living in Canada for almost five months,” Second Harvest said.

A different end

Produce that can’t be eaten by humans still doesn’t go in the trash, Kolochuk noted.

Part of the company’s no-garbage policy includes partnerships with local farmers, who take the otherwise unwanted food for use by livestock.

Last winter, after one of the worst droughts in history, a number of livestock producers sought alternative feeds such as vegetables.

The post Nothing for the bin appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.

The Global Food Security Index comprises a set of indices from more than 120 different countries. Since 2012, it has been based on four main pillars: food access, safety, sustainable development and food affordability.

The approach is quite comprehensive and robust. Index indicators include nutritional standards, urban absorptive capacity, food consumption as a percentage of household expenditure, food loss and waste, protein quality, agricultural import tariffs, dietary diversification, agricultural infrastructure, volatility of agricultural production, public expenditure on agricultural resource and development, corruption, risk of political stability, and even the sufficiency of supply.

This year, Finland ranks first, followed by Ireland and Norway. Canada is well positioned compared to other countries around the world, since we are ranked seventh globally, same as last year. Not bad. The United States is 13th.

In terms of food access, which measures agricultural production, farm capacities and the risk of supply disruption, Canada ranks sixth, which is not too surprising. Despite our recent episodes of empty shelves and stockouts, food abundance is certainly something Canada can boast about. We produce a lot, and we are also part of a fluid North American economy, focused on cross-border trade. All of this allows for better food access.

Another pillar focuses on sustainable development, the environment and climate adaptability. This pillar assesses a country’s exposure to the impacts of climate change, its sensitivity to risks related to natural resources, food waste management, and how the country adapts to these risks. In this regard, Canada is ranked 29th, far behind Norway and Finland, who are first and second for this category.

Food waste remains Canada’s Achilles heel, as we waste more than just about anyone else on the planet. But with higher food prices, more than 40 per cent of Canadians are wasting less than they were 12 months ago, according to a recent study.

When it comes to food safety and quality, Canada ranks first in the world, no less. Canada is ahead of everyone, even Denmark and the United States, both renowned for their proactive approaches to food safety.

Food safety in Canada is perhaps the aspect most underappreciated by consumers. Despite a few momentary failures and periodic reminders, sanitation practices in the country are exemplary. For years, Canada has consistently ranked well, except perhaps when traceability is measured. We have a long way to go, but otherwise the industry and our public safety regulators are performing relatively well.

However, due to climate change and continually changing risks, we must constantly adapt. Despite the fine performance, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is not resting on these laurels. Far from it.

But the area where Canada’s performance is of some concern is food affordability. This measure is dedicated to consumers’ ability to purchase food, their vulnerability to price shocks, and the presence of programs and policies to support consumers when shocks occur.

Canada fell one spot again this year and sits at 25th in the world. Australia, Singapore and Holland top the list for affordability. Given the resources and food access we have, Canada should do better. Since July 2021, food inflation has always exceeded general inflation in the country, and everything is already costing more these days. Higher food prices at the grocery store over the past year have been difficult for many of us to accept.

Canada needs a food autonomy policy, a stronger food processing sector and better logistics domestically.

And with winter coming, coupled with our dollar visibly weakening against the U.S. dollar, we could see significant price jumps again, especially in the produce and non-perishables sections. As wages stagnate and food prices rise, it’s hard to predict when Canada will do better in terms of affordability. Certain fiscal measures such as tax reductions to help consumers would be more than timely.

– Sylvain Charlebois is professor of food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University and senior director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab.

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The plant’s 250-odd workers, represented by the Syndicat des salaries de la fromagerie — an arm of Centrale des syndicats democratiques (CSD) — have voted 73 per cent to ratify an agreement in principle with the company and were to return to work Monday (Aug. 8), the union said in a release Wednesday.

Off the job since June 29, the employees “will gradually return to work next week to clean the plant in order to resume cheese production as soon as possible,” Agropur said in a separate statement Wednesday.

Producteurs de lait du Quebec president Daniel Gobeil on July 22 had written to the company, reiterating the dairy farmer group’s request for at least a minimal level of processing work to continue at the facility, to prevent milk waste.

Quebec media reports put the Granby plant’s processing capacity at about 800,000 litres per day.

The Granby plant will now start receiving milk “in the coming weeks,” Agropur said Wednesday, which “will help ensure the supply of our customers and avoid further food waste.”

Agropur said it “believes that it has reached an agreement with the employees that will ensure stability for the coming years.”

The new collective agreement expires July 23, 2026, the union said.

“If we have reached an agreement that suits our members, it is because they have remained united throughout the conflict,” CSD counsel Bernard Cournoyer said in the union’s release.

The deal includes increases of between 2.5 and 3.5 per cent in annual worker salaries, increased RRSP contributions from the company and concessions on allowances and advances due to disability-related absences, and on choosing vacation days, the union said. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Carbon Lock Technologies was one of 18 companies, and the only Manitoba business, to be named a semi-finalist in the novel technologies stream of the federal government’s Food Waste Reduction Challenge.

Why it matters: A select handful of businesses are getting federal support to bring food-saving technologies from concept to commercial production.

The challenge, announced in late 2020, offered funding for businesses to develop either business models or new technologies to prevent waste, extend food life and either divert or otherwise find uses for food waste. Applications were taken through the first part of 2021.

Among the criteria, AAFC says semi-finalists were chosen by “potential volume of food waste reduction, level of innovation and scalability as well as environmental, social and economic benefits.”

The Winnipeg business made the cut out of 238 novel technology applications.

Back to the soil

The idea, according to Carbon Lock Technologies CEO Kevin Danner, is to carbonize food waste into “biochar” — a charcoal-like product that the company says can be worked into the soil to bolster soil carbon. From there, the company’s pitch echoes many of the rationales underpinning regenerative agriculture practices to increase soil carbon, things like carbon sequestration, a more robust soil biology or improved nutrient cycling and water infiltration.

But while the final product appears charcoal-like, Danner said that the process does not include combustion.

“We are carbonizing the waste, which is different than combustion,” he said. “There are no flames. We’re not trying to produce a renewable gas. We’re not trying to produce bio-oils… we’re trying to capture the carbon that is in the food waste.”

Danner hopes that the process will help divert food waste away from the landfill and add another option for that diverted waste, one outside of existing options like compost, or biofuel production.

“It prevents the production of methane or greenhouse gases from the waste,” he said. “In the other solutions — compost is good, if people can have compost in their garden, that’s great, but when you start doing large amounts of compost industrial(ly), there are greenhouse gases produced. When you gasify it or (use) anaerobic digestion, you are essentially trying to make a hydrocarbon, which is good, but again, when you combust it, you get greenhouse gases.”

The company has also said it hopes to make its product more accessible for farmers.

Most of the market for this type of product is small bags, sold for horticulture or gardening, Danner acknowledged, although some other Canadian companies are starting to scale up.

His vision is quite a bit larger.

“We would like to get to the point were we’re going to be able to sell truckloads to agricultural producers,” he said. “We would like to be able to develop it so the agricultural producer is able to provide us with the waste — either its food waste or agricultural waste — we convert it into the biocarbon and then bring it back to the producer.”

Processing byproducts from Manitoba’s agri-food industry is another possible source of feedstock, he noted.

Further down the road, Danner said, there may be a system where producers buy equipment to produce their own biochar on farm.

Carbon Lock Technologies hopes to have the third version of their prototype ready for testing this summer. The product will likely see testing throughout the next year, as well as in-field agricultural testing next summer, Danner said, and is likely “a year or two” out from commercialization.

The company turned to Red River College Polytech to help develop the product, and has gained funding from the provincial government, Research Manitoba and the National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program, outside of newly announced federal funds.

Carbon Lock Technologies must now make the case for its biochar product, in the hopes of making the cut as one of up to six finalists, to be announced later this year through the novel technologies stream of the Food Waste Reduction Challenge. That next step comes with an extra $450,000, meant to further hone and test products.

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A Winkler-area feedlot has found success cleaning up cull potatoes and will soon be adding ‘pea cream,’ a Roquette waste product, to its ration.

“The economics of it just work out,” said Herman Peters, nutrition manager for Birkland Farms. “It’s been a good little trade for us.”

Why it matters: Food waste can save producers money and help eliminate waste and excess pollution, creating a true win win.

Peters joined researchers Kim Ominski and Tim McAllister on a panel discussion about food waste and livestock operations during a University of Manitoba webinar on February 1.

Between a video and live discussion, Peters described how the farm gets waste potatoes from Winkler facilities — spuds that are not the right size or quality for the grocery store.

“We see it as an energy source,” he said in the video presentation. “If you wanted to compare it to another grain it would be similar to barley.”

On a dry matter basis, feeder cattle at Birkland get between 20 and 40 per cent potatoes in their ration. Potatoes are broken with a roller-mill to prevent choking and to help keep cattle from ignoring the rest of their feed.

“They look at potatoes as candy,” Peters said.

Because cattle like potatoes, farm workers drop rations twice or three times per feeding. This way animals that make it to the bunk late still get a shot at the spuds.

Potatoes for cattle is hardly novel, but soon Birkland will begin feeding a new byproduct — pea cream from the Portage la Prairie pea processor Roquette, Peters said.

Pea cream is a liquid product “obtained from the wet refining of yellow peas following the extraction of the starch and protein fractions,” Roquette’s website says.

As of Feb. 1, Birkland had received one load of pea cream, Peters said. They’re waiting until they have a steady supply before they begin feeding it full time.

The farm has a two-year contract with Roquette and will get pea cream year round, Peters said. This required building a storage building for the cream. Roquette provided an initial sample for testing and also gives them data like the dry matter content and pH of the cream.

The cream is hot when it arrives — about 50 C, Peters said.

“It’s going to be nice in winter,” he said.

They fed it once to cattle to see how cattle reacted. They didn’t seem to notice much, said Peters.

“Palatability should be there,” he said.

The pea cream is high in protein, Peters added. He said they’re currently running a 42 per cent protein supplement. Since the cream is 23 per cent protein, they’ll be able to reduce protein supplementation significantly.

Peters said he regularly tests his feed for nutrient content.

“We’re not talking about producers randomly throwing things into the diet here. This is very calculated,” Tim McAllister reminded the online audience. McAllister is a researcher with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

Using food waste in animal diets addresses waste management, food security, and resource and environmental challenges, wrote McAllister, Ominski and colleagues in a paper published in Animal Frontiers in March 2021.

“Livestock as ‘upcyclers’ play a critical role in the solution to reducing food loss and waste, with the potential to convert inedible foods into high-quality protein,” they wrote.

There’s opportunity to include more food waste in animal diets, they added. Availability of byproduct — e.g. oat hulls, soybeans and sunflowers — will increase as demand for fractionated products (made into things like meat substitutes) increases, the paper says.

Of over 60 million metric tons (MMT) of dairy, eggs, field crops, produce, meat, seafood and sugar that entered the food system in 2016, under 26 MMT were consumed. Over 30 per cent of that was deemed avoidable food waste, the researchers wrote.

However, cleaning up this waste is not as simple as throwing it in the feed bunk.

For one, the researchers wrote, it must be economically viable to transport it. Collecting and distributing the waste is a “global challenge,” they wrote.

The CFIA also must approve products as feed before they can be used. The feed must be safe, and it must be assessed for nutrient quality.

The researchers also cautioned that “upstream” impacts on the environment, like energy, fertilizer, water use, greenhouse gases and others must also be considered when developing food waste disposal strategies.

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Food is a precious thing, and is always of value to someone, somewhere. Associating food with the term “waste” can only imply that food can become worthless. We can compost it, use it to produce biofuels, and of course, we can repurpose it and even rescue it. It’s not really wasted. Since food prices are progressively increasing these days, the entire food supply chain is now empowering consumers to rescue food, more than ever. Yes, rescue food.

Grocers are no longer putting a rack of shelves in some obscure spot in the grocery store to sell off discounted food products that are about to expire. In fact, as you walk into a grocery store, any store really, it is common now to see discounted food products displayed prominently in a busy section of the store. These discounts can be substantial, ranging from 25 per cent to 50 per cent in some cases.

Many have noticed that the “enjoy tonight” deals are becoming more common, especially at the meat counter. While grocers can reduce food spoilage, consumers are given an opportunity to “rescue” food from an almost certain fate in a landfill. According to a recent survey by the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University, in partnership with Caddle, a total of 39.6 per cent of Canadians are purchasing discounted products – with expiry or best before dates within a few days of purchase – more often than in 2020. A total of 26.9 per cent of Canadians are buying products with the “enjoy tonight” label more often than in 2020.

The “pay what you feel” movement is also taking off. The Food Stash Foundation, a Vancouver-based charity, launched the Rescued Food Market at Olympic Village in the city on October 1. The group rescues well over 60,000 pounds of food per month, which would have otherwise gone to landfills. The Rescued Food Market will stock perishable foods including produce, meat, cheese, milk, and eggs. Inventories in the store come from grocery stores, wholesalers, and farms. The store encourages everyone to donate or pay what they believe the food they’re taking is worth.

Another location in Toronto, called “Pay What You Can Grocery Store, Cafe, and Bakery” on Dundas Street just opened a few days ago, with the same operating model. It’s all about retailing food, repurposing, and reducing spoilage. We’re expecting more of these types of stores to open in the months to come.

Can’t go to these locations? No problem. Your cellphone now has you covered. Apps like Flashfood and FoodHero will tell you about the daily deals in your neighbourhood, regardless of where you are in the country. Some discounts can be as high as 50 per cent. These apps are useful portals, allowing consumers substantial bargains, while helping the environment, if you’re willing to compromise on freshness, of course. But for many consumers, compromising on quality and freshness is still not an option.

But food rescuing is far from new. Second Harvest, the largest food rescue program in the country, has been at this for 36 years already. It redistributes enough food to make over 60,000 meals per day. The issues of food waste and food rescuing have since attracted attention for both environmental and food security reasons. Indeed, Second Harvest’s greatest achievement has been to create competition for itself, getting more people involved in valuing all the food we have, while eliminating the stigma of food waste. Saving food is now a cool thing to do, which was not the case back in 1985 when Second Harvest started.

More than 35.5 million tons of perfectly good food are thrown out each year in Canada, enough to fill 319,000 Boeing 787 Dreamliners. The thought of all the work and resources invested in producing this food, only to be thrown away, is causing consumers to change their food choices.

Consumers are responsible for 48 per cent of all the food wasted, more food than farmers, processors, and grocers. It’s only fitting to see consumers as the best potential food rescuers.

Instead of hoarding food, consumers should be thinking about doing the complete opposite. Buying food as you need it will certainly get you to save and rescue more food. With current food economic trends, consumers will be rewarded for patience and for using multiple points of purchase.

Our food budgets have been challenged of late. Nonetheless, food is getting only more expensive, except if you seek out the rescuing opportunities you have.

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