A nationwide digital freight network, Convoy, recently announced that it has entered in a new partnership with the largest hunger-relief organization in the U.S., Feeding America®, to redirect rejected food shipments to food banks across the country instead of disposing it in landfills.

A food supply chain is trained only to move goods in an assigned direction, and people find it easier to dump the rejected products, instead of rerouting them through an unfamiliar, complex reverse logistics process.

Digital Freight Network of Convoy will leverage the MealConnect technology of Feeding America to aid truckers across the U.S. having troubles with rejected food & beverage shipments to locate closest food bank and reroute drivers to deliver the surplus items.

The edible food is going to waste at an alarming rate in the U.S. According to estimates from ReFED, around 72 billion pounds of consumable food does not make it onto dinner tables, every year. Annually, this amounts to roughly 40% of all food in the U.S.

Jennifer Wong, Convoy’s head of sustainability was reported to state that the company is elated to collaborate with Feeding America and to minimize waste in trucking while redirecting massive quantities of food for the needy section of the society.

Wong added that the company is highly optimistic about the progress the companies have already made in partnership and with the food & beverage customers that are looking forward to adopting innovative sustainability practices.

For the record, Feeding America, a US-based non-profit organization has a network of 200 food banks, that operate like warehouses and are linked with around 60,000 localized food pantries and soup kitchens countrywide. For the extra stops, the drivers are compensated for the and the NGO provides receipts and reports to acknowledge the contributions.

 

Source Credit: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200319005129/en/Convoy-Work-Feeding-America-Give-Americas-Food