Dear Tufts Dining Services, 

We, the students of Tufts University, are asking for a change. Every day, pounds and pounds of food go to waste. Signs in the dining halls say that 212 tons of food is composted a year. Yet some of this food does not have to be composted. This food, the food that is untouched and still in trays or has not yet been heated, is perfectly good to eat and instead it gets tossed away. Universities across the country have implemented food rescue programs in their dining halls to ensure that the food students don’t eat can be eaten by those who go hungry. It is time for Tufts to do the same.

In fact, 12 percent of families in Massachusetts are food insecure. We can change this. There are already programs in place to take the food off of Tufts’ hands. Food for Free, a recently established organization, has already begun taking food from Harvard and repackaging it to give out to people who need it. The onus is a small one to allow Food for Free to begin working with Tufts—Tufts need only purchase a blast freezer to ensure that the food does not spoil in transit. Everything else is already in place.

The programs exist. The student involvement exists. We just need your commitment.

Tufts prides itself on being a beacon of progressiveness and for having a positive impact in surrounding communities, yet this is an area in which Tufts could have a direct, tangible impact-- and it has been overlooked. We have created this petition to demonstrate that the student body cares about this issue and that it is time to take the small but powerful step that ensures the success of a food rescue system. If the aforementioned suggestions were implemented, Tufts would further fulfill their claim to be a leader in the global and local community and would contribute to the eradication of an incredibly impactful issue.

With hope and passion,

Students of Tufts