Midwest Entrepreneurs are Stepping Up to Curb Food Waste

Midwest Entrepreneurs are Stepping Up to Curb Food Waste

By: Lea Hensel, Business and Community Services

This September, an event is happening in downtown Des Moines that is the first of its kind for our state.

The Midwest Food Recovery Summit is bringing together businesses, organizations, and individuals from a wide range of industries for one focus – food. In particular, food waste.

While food waste used to be a topic covered primarily by those in the environmental industry, over the past few years, it has become more of a mainstream conversation. The show Chopped on Food Network has featured food waste as its primary ingredients to be used to make meals. Talk show hosts are talking about it. Companies large and small are making reducing food waste and donating excess food a staple in their business operations. And entrepreneurs have even been featured on SharkTank, and received a deal.

As with pretty much every industry, entrepreneurs are stepping up to come up with solutions to solve industry problems. Food waste is no different and the Midwest Food Recovery Summit is actually hosting a session focused on these entrepreneurs.

The Innovator Lightning Round is scheduled for Thursday, September 9 and is going to feature nine Midwest entrepreneurs that will present flash presentations about the ways they have figured out to prevent, reduce, recover, and/or recycle food that would have otherwise been thrown away. Three participants even hail from our very own state!

These entrepreneurs have come up with a wide range of products and services to tackle food waste head on. After the flash presentations, attendees will get to participate in a Q&A with the innovators.

The event is being hosted by one of IASourceLink’s resource partners, which was featured earlier this year on the blog, the Iowa Waste Reduction Center, along with their summit partner, BioCycle. To learn more about the Midwest Food Recovery Summit, visit https://iwrc.uni.edu/foodrecoverysummit/.

Share this post