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May 15, 2023

"You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them. This is how prayer works." --Pope Francis

Transforming Food

"Weaving webs around the highways of northeast England, the REfUSE van was collectively funded by 315 people. They gave amounts ranging from fifty-pence pieces to four-digit sums until the great day when we could finally drive it off the lot and park it next to its newly installed electric charger. Each month it intercepts around thirteen tons of in-date food, otherwise destined for the dumpster, from retailers and food manufacturers. Then the food can make its way toward dinner tables through our caf, restaurant, school projects, pay what you can shelves, and delivery boxes. When we first started gathering food and people, those road webs were spun by our feet and a sagging green 2004 Golf. Before we had a five-thousand-square-foot, temperature-controlled warehouse, we had a lounge crammed with boxes and piled high with pumpkins. Before we had partnership agreements with large retail firms, we walked to and from any produce sellers we could find, and hoisted one another into supermarket dumpsters after dark." Read on to learn more about how a small band of dumpster divers has become a driving force for food rescue and redistribution.