{"id":3826,"date":"2022-12-21T11:24:11","date_gmt":"2022-12-21T16:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/?page_id=3826"},"modified":"2025-01-27T13:08:06","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T18:08:06","slug":"maine-home-food-waste-challenge","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/maine-home-food-waste-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"Maine Home Food Waste Challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"<style>.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa\"]{text-align:center;font-size:var(--global-kb-font-size-lg, 2rem);font-style:normal;color:#082e58;}.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa mark.kt-highlight, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa\"] mark.kt-highlight{font-style:normal;color:#f76a0c;-webkit-box-decoration-break:clone;box-decoration-break:clone;padding-top:0px;padding-right:0px;padding-bottom:0px;padding-left:0px;}.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa img.kb-inline-image, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa\"] img.kb-inline-image{width:150px;vertical-align:baseline;}<\/style>\n<p class=\"kt-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa wp-block-kadence-advancedheading\" data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_74f1e4-fa\"><strong>The Maine Home Food Waste Challenge<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In January and February of 2023, Food Rescue MAINE piloted the Maine Home Food Waste Challenge to reduce household food waste. During this challenge, the average household reduced their food waste by 20%. On this page, you can find all the information you need to try it yourself!<\/p>\n\n\n<style>.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d\"]{text-align:center;font-size:var(--global-kb-font-size-md, 1.25rem);font-style:normal;color:#082e58;}.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d mark.kt-highlight, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d\"] mark.kt-highlight{font-style:normal;color:#f76a0c;-webkit-box-decoration-break:clone;box-decoration-break:clone;padding-top:0px;padding-right:0px;padding-bottom:0px;padding-left:0px;}.wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d img.kb-inline-image, .wp-block-kadence-advancedheading.kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d[data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d\"] img.kb-inline-image{width:150px;vertical-align:baseline;}<\/style>\n<p class=\"kt-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d wp-block-kadence-advancedheading\" data-kb-block=\"kb-adv-heading3826_55fd9d-5d\"><em>Food Waste is a Problem- YOU Can Make a Difference!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Did you know\u2026<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>30-40% of the food that we produce is never eaten \u2013 and that the average family of four wastes almost $2000 per year on food that we throw away?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>And in Maine, while our food prices are skyrocketing, food is still the single largest part of our trash!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Make a difference today\u2026<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Save nearly $24\/person per week.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Save valuable fresh water, energy, and labor used to produce food that is thrown out.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Donations to food banks could triple and help end hunger in Maine.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Food trash would not go to landfills where it produces methane gas\u2013 a leading contributor to climate change.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Want to do the Home Food Waste Challenge?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Here\u2019s how it works:&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Follow the challenge instructions to learn how to track your waste.<strong><em><a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/maine-home-food-waste-challenge-instructions-and-form\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&nbsp;(Link here)<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Record your food waste on this printable table<strong><em><a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/615\/2022\/12\/MaineFoodChallengeTracker.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&nbsp;(Link here)<\/a><\/em><\/strong>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Week 1:&nbsp;<\/strong>Track your food waste without changing any of your typical habits- this will show you your home\u2019s baseline for food waste<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Week 2:<\/strong>&nbsp;Track your food waste while using these tips&nbsp;<em><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/challenge-week-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">(Link here)<\/a><\/strong><\/em>. Did you waste less food?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Week 3:<\/strong>&nbsp;Track your food waste while using these tips&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/challenge-week-3\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em><strong>(Link here)<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. Did you waste less food?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Week 4:<\/strong>&nbsp;Track your food waste while using these tips&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/challenge-week-4\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em><strong>(Link here)<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. Did you waste less food?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Beyond the Maine Home Food Waste Challenge-<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Keep collecting and reducing your food waste to save money, help your community, protect our beautiful Maine environment, and fight climate change.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Check our&nbsp;<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u=8d0889470befa3a8cb3a8ef9d&amp;id=d48a28b321&amp;e=52af43d620\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Food Rescue MAINE website<\/a><\/strong>&nbsp;and social media for new Maine food waste reduction tips and ideas for you and your community!<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Check out our Food Waste Summits <a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/media\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>here<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have questions or comments, please email:&nbsp;<a href=\"mailto:foodrescuemaine@maine.edu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">foodrescuemaine@maine.edu<\/a>, or call: 207-581-3196.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And remember, visit the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/umaine.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u=8d0889470befa3a8cb3a8ef9d&amp;id=92a7164f11&amp;e=52af43d620\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Challenge Facebook Group<\/a>&nbsp;to share your own Challenge experience, photos, and food waste reduction ideas with others!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Frequently Asked Questions:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;What is food waste?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;Great question! Usually, people divide food waste into two labels: \u2018edible\u2019 and \u2018inedible.\u2019 The simple idea is that food waste is any food that could be consumed \u2013 but it is thrown away at the retail or consumption level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;What is edible food waste?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;Edible food waste goes hand in hand with the simple definition of food waste, because it is anything that you intend on consuming but ultimately throw away. The reason for edible food waste is usually because of food spoilage, improper storage, or purchasing too large of a quantity of a certain food item.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;What is inedible food waste?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;Inedible food waste is a bit different from edible food waste! The parts of food that you do not intend to eat \u2013 such as peels, bones, rinds, and cores \u2013 are considered inedible. Essentially, any pieces or parts of food that you typically throw away because you do not plan on consuming them, are parts of inedible food waste.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;Why not differentiate between edible and inedible food waste in this Challenge?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;There are several ways to go about categorizing food waste, but we wanted to make one uniform measure for our Maine Home Food Waste Challenge 2023! The problem with differentiating between edible and inedible food waste is that people set different criteria for what they will and will not eat. For example, you might throw away banana peels, but I might eat them! This measure would then change our food waste values in the Challenge, though we both technically consumed one banana. The other, and main reason for including ALL food waste (edible and inedible) is that we want to focus on reducing all types of food waste. There are several interesting and edible ways to use these \u2018inedible\u2019 pieces of food \u2013 such as vegetable stock made from all types of vegetable trimmings. The goal of this Challenge is to reduce food waste in households all throughout Maine, so we want participants to count all kinds of food waste as a part of this goal!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;If I compost food waste, should I record it? Or do I only record the food I throw into the trash can?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;For our Maine Home Food Waste Challenge 2023, we are focused on capturing all food waste in hopes of reduction for households. Of course, composting is better and more sustainable than sending food to landfills, but for this particular Challenge, we are interested in seeing how much food waste households can reduce by tracking for four weeks. We would recommend that you compost whatever food waste you collect throughout the week rather than throwing it away, but that is up to you!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question:<\/strong>&nbsp;If I have more than one person in my household, how do I count meals eaten out and meals eaten at home?<br><strong>Answer:<\/strong>&nbsp;The point of our Maine Home Food Waste Challenge 2023 is to note how much food people waste, but the household size often differs between participants. When you submit your count for meals eaten out, you can choose one of the three categories based on the average of your household. For example, if you have a family of four and you went out to dinner twice in one week, you can simply answer that your household is in the category of \u20180-2\u2019 meals eaten out per week. The categories help in decoding where your household is most likely to waste, and they help by separating people with different patterns. If I ate out 10 times per week and I only had one pound of food waste, this is likely because I barely ate at home. When you submit your count for meals eaten at home, you can submit the total number of meals for each member of your household \u2013 so if you are in a household of four people and you ate 20 meals at home this week with other members of your household, you can submit \u201820\u2019 to make sure all people in your household are accounted for.<\/p>\n\n\n<style>.wp-block-kadence-spacer.kt-block-spacer-3826_1a585b-6d .kt-block-spacer{height:153px;}.wp-block-kadence-spacer.kt-block-spacer-3826_1a585b-6d .kt-divider{border-top-width:1px;height:1px;border-top-color:#eee;width:80%;border-top-style:solid;}<\/style>\n<div class=\"wp-block-kadence-spacer aligncenter kt-block-spacer-3826_1a585b-6d\"><div class=\"kt-block-spacer kt-block-spacer-halign-center\"><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Maine Home Food Waste Challenge In January and February of 2023, Food Rescue MAINE piloted the Maine Home Food Waste Challenge to reduce household food waste. During this challenge, the average household reduced their food waste by 20%. On this page, you can find all the information you need to try it yourself! Food [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1924,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"templates\/page-withsidebar.php","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-3826","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Maine Home Food Waste Challenge - Food Rescue MAINE<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/umaine.edu\/foodrescuemaine\/maine-home-food-waste-challenge\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Maine Home Food Waste Challenge - Food Rescue MAINE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Maine Home Food Waste Challenge In January and February of 2023, Food Rescue MAINE piloted the Maine Home Food Waste Challenge to reduce household food waste. 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