Georgia Southern professors team up to reduce food waste on Statesboro Campus

Three Georgia Southern University professors have been awarded a $40,000 grant from the Center for Sustainability to fund a project that will focus on recycling and reducing food waste in the dining halls on Georgia Southern’s Statesboro Campus.

Padmini Shankar, Ph.D., professor of nutrition and food science in the Department of Health Sciences and Kinesiology, in collaboration with Evans Afriyie-Gyawu, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Environmental Health Sciences, and Vinoth Sittaramane, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Biology, are working on the project, “Food Waste Recycling and Education to Promote Sustainability at Georgia Southern University and the Community.”

“Food waste is a monumental problem in the United States,” stated Shankar. “The proposed project utilizes innovative strategies to recycle campus food waste into compost and feed for poultry and aquaculture.”

The project will also implement on- and off-campus educational intervention activities to educate students on the most effective and efficient means of reducing food waste. Long-term benefits of the project include increasing awareness about food waste, decreasing campus food waste, enhancing the profitability of farming and reducing the impact of food waste on the environment.

The project will be presented as an interactive exhibit during the Sustainability Showcase Exhibit schedule in April 2020

This project expands on another sustainability project, “Reducing Food Waste as Part of Sustainability Efforts on Georgia Southern Campus” that was funded by the Center for Sustainability and conducted by Afriyie-Gyawu during the 2017-18 academic year.

The project’s grant is funded by Student Sustainability Fees, which funds several sustainability projects each year. Since 2014, more than $1.25 million in Sustainability Fee Grants has been awarded to support campus sustainability efforts.

This is a press release from Georgia Southern University.