College of Saint Benedict
IN-2: Innovation 2

For the past 4 years, the College of St. Benedict has been working with local farmers in a program to recycle food waste. This program allows the institution to give uneaten food in the cafeteria to local farmers to be used as hog feed. The purpose of this program is to reduce the amount of waste generated from the dining services of this institution and also reducing our landfill disposal. An average of 84 barrels of food is given to local farmers each month which is roughly 15960 pounds of food recycled each month. Barthold Food Recycling is the company that collects the food from St. Bens. Their company focuses on being environmentally responsible by recycling food waste. This program also aims to help family owned local farms by providing them with quality feed for their animals. Barthold uses the food to feed hogs on their farms, as well as a few other family farms nearby. They steam and cook the food on site and then feed it directly to their animals shortly after. The food that is given to the hogs also allows our institution to reuse something that would otherwise be wasted. Farmers use the waste by cooking it to make it consumable and wholesome for their animals. No other chemicals or materials are added to the food waste generated by the institution. Additionally it decreased the amount of food that farmers need to produce to feed their animals. Since the waste is used directly as food, there is no need to produce new food and no need to use resources to do so. The entire program is sustainable for all those involved and beneficial to both our institution and the farmers.