It’s been over a month since U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Thomas J. Vilsack announced the release of the federal government’s National Strategy for Reducing Food Loss and Waste and Recycling Organics at the annual ReFED Food Waste Solutions Summit. Still, I’ll be honest—it hasn’t completely sunk in yet. Ten years ago, I never would have imagined this happening. Simply the existence of this strategy demonstrates a level of attention that food loss and waste (FLW) has never before seen at the federal level.

Is it going to solve everything? No. But it does do a few things.

What the Strategy Does

First, it doubles down on a variety of existing federal programs. Many of these, such as the Small Business Innovation Research program and the USDA’s Local Agriculture Market Program grants, are grant programs that could include FLW but are broad enough that they also may not. By being called out in this strategy, a new level of priority is being placed on addressing FLW within those programs—and I expect that this will increase the focus and dollar amounts attributed to FLW.

Second, it’s exciting to see some new efforts included. I’m most excited about those focused on consumer education and behavior. The strategy commits EPA to developing and implementing a national consumer campaign and USDA to investing in behavioral science research which presumably would inform the campaign. More food gets wasted at the household level than anywhere else in the supply chain, so this is a big deal—it’s past due for this huge driver of food waste to be addressed in a comprehensive way. And given the cost of campaigns like this and the need for a single, umbrella campaign for others to use (think “Smokey Bear” but for food waste), it really needs to come from the federal government.

Next, on the organics recycling front, it’s good to see more money proposed by the federal government for composting and organics recycling infrastructure. But… it’s still not enough. Converting the system for the entire nation will cost much more, and government grants are a critical funding source—for example, we would have loved to see more dollars from EPA’s Climate Pollution Reduction Grants program going to this. In reality, though, only a tiny fraction of the nearly $5B that was just given out will actually go towards FLW or organics diversion infrastructure.

Lastly, I appreciate the framing in the strategy. By separating food loss, food waste, and organics management, the strategy has established the need to approach each of these aspects of FLW differently, which is what they really call for.

Unanswered Questions

While I’m glad to see all of these above aspects in the strategy—and so many more things that it’s hard to cover it all here—I do have some overarching questions. Namely, how much will the White House and the agencies listed in the strategy put their money where their strategy is? It’s possible that having the grant programs listed in there will result in more funding to FLW, but there is no mechanism to ensure that, so it’s also possible that it won’t. How much funding will be committed to a public education campaign, or some of the other new initiatives mentioned? Also, what is the timeline for some of the initiatives mentioned in the campaign? An annual report to capture what the government has actually done to follow this strategy, including dollar amounts, would be a helpful tool for accountability.

My other overarching observation is that the strategy lacks a bit of a, well, strategy. The main framework of loss, waste, organics, and policy works well, but the programs underneath that seem to be a smattering of what various departments felt was possible right now. It doesn’t start at the highest level of “how does the U.S. government impact FLW, what are the most important steps to change that, and how will we implement those steps.” I would love to see a more systematic assessment by some of the key agencies—particularly USDA and FDA—of how every one of their programs that touches food impacts waste. Then, with that as a foundation, they could look to make changes within those that have the most impact. For instance, perhaps they would prioritize re-evaluating aspects of USDA’s food grading system over programs with the private yacht industry.

Everyone Plays a Part

Overall though, this strategy is progress! It’s a testament to the growing salience of food waste as a climate solution and the hard work and passion of those inside and outside of the federal government who have been working hard on this issue for years. It’s also a reminder of how complex the issue is. Food waste is a systemwide problem, and the breadth of this strategy—from packaging research to swine feed to cold storage loans to airlines and beyond—really drives that home.

What’s also clear though is that the government can’t solve this alone. It’s exciting to see the government leaning in, but it also reminds us that we all have our part to play as well. Policy can provide the spark that moves other players in the food system to action, but it’s up to us to turn it into a roaring fire.