NFRD Who's Who: Q&A with Christopher Bradshaw of Dreaming Out Loud

This is first post in our NFRD Who's Who series, a series of interviews with the fantastic leaders who will be speaking at the National Food Recovery Dialogue on April 2-4. Stay tuned – we'll be sharing more interviews as we count down to the NFRD. 

Christopher Bradshaw is the founder and executive director of Dreaming Out Loud, whose mission is to build an equitable food system, grow economic opportunity for marginalized people, and more resilient communities. Since their founding in 2014, they've worked with farmers markets to bring more than 250,000 pounds fresh produce to the food deserts of DC. We can't wait for Christopher to present his talk "From Rosewood to Real Time: Food Justice and Economic Justice In America" at the NFRD!

FRN: What are you looking forward to at the conference?

CB: I'm most looking forward to a conversation with the students and hearing about the work being done in food recovery; where the innovation is in the space and moving conversations forward. I think conversations help to frame circumstances and push folks to find ways of acting within their world. We are at a critical juncture; policy needs to move to open up resources to undergird individuals and communities with skills and supports eroded by a profit-over-people economic system. We need to shape a national vision of the food and economic system towards one that creates living wage jobs and moves towards a restorative, regenerative social justice narrative; beyond band-aids, to systemic, structural social revolution that has justice as its core value. 

FRN: Why are you passionate about food recovery?

CB: I am passionate about creating a stronger, more just and sustainable food system because I think that so many broad issues of social justice intersect with the food system. From racial justice resulting from land loss, economic devastation, and displacement; to workers rights, living wages and income disparity; to repairing the wounds of mass incarceration and creating pathways for returning citizens. Just means justice; it means uncomfortable, but honest conversations bout restoring communities, transcending our politics, and building the world we envision through the lens of food.

FRN: What's your proudest accomplishment of your career?

CB: My proudest professional accomplishment is just making it through the darkness. It is hard starting an organization, stewarding it through growth, and moving it into a place where it hold true to its values; and meets community needs in ways that empower and facilitate agency. Maybe my proudest moment is yet to come, as I am excited for the day when I let go allow Dreaming Out Loud to go free. 

FRN: Time for some fun. What's your spirit vegetable?

CB: My spirit vegetable is the pole bean. Random; I know. I just love the way that pole beans find a way to climb up from seemingly anywhere, or out of nowhere, guided by what I have no idea. Somehow, what seems like overnight, poles beans through some dogged strength reach further and further towards the sun to find a guiding strand of twine, or fencing, or a the limb of a tree. Whatever that force is that is guiding that pole bean is unseen, but it just knows that if it keeps trying it will find it's guiding support and grow to what it knows that it can be.

Interested in learning more about Christopher's work with Dreaming Out Loud? Register for the National Food Recovery Dialogue today and follow Dreaming Out Loud on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

From Regina's Desk: A Love Sonnet

Since it’s February, and I’m a huge fan of celebrating FRNdships on Valentine’s Day, I wanted to express my love of all of you with a sonnet. I figured if Shakespeare can do it, I can, too, right? Let us know if you have any FRN-inspired poetry you’d like to share!  Post on Facebook and tag FRN or shoot us an email: info@foodrecoverynetwork.org.

Why I Love FRN

There! Across the country zips back and forth

a committed network of people yield

a pathway for change on campus, on earth;

The simple solution to all, revealed!

Dedication and grit has caused great shifts

in thinking to action: recovery!

when I think about your amazing gifts

To this movement, further discovery

Food Recovery Network such a site

To be part of the will, to do what’s right.

To read more from our Executive Director, Regina Northouse, check out her most recent posts in our From Regina's Desk series: Growing Stronger Every Day, From One Milestone to the Next, and more!

FRN Featured on Food Tank

Cam, our Director of Innovation and Operations, harvests swiss chard during an afternoon volunteering with City Blossoms in Washington, D.C.

If you haven't heard, we're big fans of Food Tank and all the awesome information they generate. It's one of the reasons why we invited Danielle Nierenberg to speak at the National Food Recovery Dialogue. When they asked to interview our very own Cam Pascual, Director of Innovation and Operations, we couldn't help but be excited. Here's a look at the great things Cam said in the article written by Emma Tozer and published on Food Tank. 

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In the United States, 95 percent of food not consumed is discarded in landfills where it breaks down to produce methane, a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide. Food Recovery Network was founded in 2011 to mitigate this waste by targeting food disposal on university campuses. Since its inception, Food Recovery Network has rescued more than one million pounds of food and has a presence on 180 college campuses across the United States. Food Recovery Network empowers citizens, communities, and food businesses to reconstruct their perceptions and habits of food surplus.

Food Tank had the opportunity to speak with Cam Pascual, Director of Innovation and Operations, at the Food Recovery Network.

Food Tank (FT): How do you contribute to creating a better food system?

Cam Pascual (CP): Food Recovery Network turns problems into solutions. Problem 1: College campuses send an estimated 22 million pounds of quality surplus food to landfills each year. Problem 2: One in six Americans don’t know where their next meal is coming from. Problem 3: College students need opportunities for meaningful service work. FRN combines these problems and turns them into one high-impact, simple solution. We unite college students at universities across the country in collecting the surplus food from their campuses and donating it to local hunger-fighting nonprofits.

FT: What is a project, program, or result you are most proud of?

CP: In under four years, Food Recovery Network went from a student group at the University of Maryland to a national nonprofit with programming at 150 schools in 36 states across the country that has so far recovered over 650,000 meals that would have otherwise been thrown away.

FT: What are your goals for this year and beyond?

CP: We plan to expand our programming beyond college campuses in coming years. We've already put higher education on track to be the first sector in which food recovery is the norm--not the exception. For 2015 and beyond we plan to expand our work to even more colleges across the country. We also offer consulting services for businesses interested in starting up their own food recovery programs, and our Food Recovery Certified program certifies businesses that do the right thing by donating their surplus food, letting consumers know where to spend their money if they care about food recovery.

FT: In one sentence, what is the most important thing eaters and consumers can do today to support a more sustainable food system?

CP: Eaters and consumers should only buy as much food as they'll consume.

FT: How can individuals become more involved in your organization?

CP: Interested college students can either start a chapter on their campus, and others can spread the word about FRN via social media, volunteer with a local chapter, or host a fundraiser to help support the work we do. We want people to start demanding food recovery--at the restaurants they visit, in their grocery stores, at their office cafeterias--because there's no reason for us to be wasting 40 percent of the food we produce while so many Americans don't know where their next meal is coming from.

Meet Sara, Director of Member Support & Communciations

Sara, FRN's Director of Member Support & Communications, gleans strawberries with the FRN team.

Have you met Sara yet? As FRN's Director of Member Support & Communications, Sara is thankful to be working to build a community of active and engaged young people that generate tangible, positive progress. She can't wait to meet everyone at the 2016 National Food Recovery Dialogue! Read more about Sara below.

Name/Nickname: Sara

Hometown: White Plains, NY

Position at FRN: Director of Member Support & Communications

What's one thing you love about FRN? Only one thing?! The FRNdship. I'm so motivated, inspired and thankful to be working to build a community of active and engaged young people. The issues of hunger and food waste (and the way they stem from and relate to social and environmental justice, poverty and climate change...) are tremendous and it's so easy to feel small and powerless. But being part of FRN is a way to take tangible, positive steps to fixing systems that are broken; changing the status quo alongside thousands of other student and community leaders. Also it's fun! As our core value says, "do good, feel good."

What are you most looking forward to at the 2016 National Food Recovery Dialogue? Lunch! No but seriously--as a national Network, the chance for all of us to be in the same physical space chatting and laughing is so special and exciting and lunch will be the first time that that will happen. I also can't wait to bring so many leaders together to celebrate our accomplishments and to dream about what's next.

What do you like to do when you're not helping fight food waste and hunger? I spend my time baking, reading, catching live music in unique spaces, visiting friends and drinking/learning about beverages.

What's your favorite food? I'm an advocate for breakfast all day, so I have to choose the open-faced waffle-egg sandwich. It starts with a waffle, then thin slices of Coulommier cheese and a fried egg, plus salt and pepper to taste. I actually haven't found Coulommier cheese since I lived in New Hampshire, but luckily brie and sharp cheddar make fine substitutes.

Are you as excited about the 2016 National Food Recovery Dialogue as Sara? Register here today.