End of the Distribution Days project

We have some not so good news. Foodsharing Luxembourg on the 31st January 2023 made the hard decision that the Distribution Days will cease to operate. 

The Distribution Days project faced internal problems and according to EU legislation are classified as a ‘business’, which meant they needed to comply with food standard regulations, which were difficult for a voluntary-run association.

The Distribution Days lead people to believe the whole of Foodsharing Luxembourg is a charity. Our main focus is the environmental aspect of food loss and waste, and we don’t want to compete with the many established charities providing professional support. We understand this perception during these difficult times, however this was never our goal. Our long-term aim is to have laws tackling food loss and food waste, so that the amounts of food that are thrown away are dramatically reduced.

Also, the Distribution Days were not in line with their goal of distributing large quantities any more. The main reason is that some businesses have now dramatically reduced their quantities, so this food could easily be shared between Foodsavers. We as an association are happy about this reduction in food waste! 

We recognise the huge contribution of the Distribution Days. There has been a lot of energy, passion and time put into them. We would like to thank everyone helping out at or coming to Distribution Days for their contribution to our vision to make sure that “all edible foods in Luxembourg are consumed”!

Our Foodsaving project will take over picking up and redistributing the food designated for the Distribution Days. If you want to join us as a Foodsaver, register. Our next information sessions will be announced in the upcoming weeks and are open for everybody interested to become active in Foodsharing Luxembourg.

Extended!

After our first call, our working group “Political work” at Foodsharing Luxembourg received interesting input. In addition to the situation in canteens and shops, we were e.g. told that subsidies are paid for the sowing of potatoes, not for harvesting them, and thus for reasons of profitability they often rot away meaninglessly on the fields. As your insight into different areas is really helpful for our work to improve the national legislation on food loss and waste, we extend our call.

Where do you see problems in the system? Are you aware of mistakes that lead to waste? Please contact us by November 6 at moien@foodsharing.lu.

All entries are processed anonymously.

Political Work Circle calls for help!

We need you!

The working group “Political Work” of Foodsharing Luxembourg is currently working on demands for an improvement of the national legislation on food loss and waste. The starting point should be an inventory.

For this, we would like your help! Where do the problems in the system lie? Are you aware of current failings that lead to food loss or food waste? Do you see patterns or contradictions in your everyday life, at work or at home that lead to waste?

Let us know at moien@foodsharing.lu by 15 October.

All submissions will be processed anonymously.

Nomadic Island project – call for participants

Nomadic Island is a social experiment which brings together a group of 11 artists from different EU countries and an intergenerational group of local residents. People between 12 and 99 years old can participate in the project, sharing the life of this temporary community on a daily basis.

The project is running from 18.07.22 to 07.08.22 at Thillebierg, in Differdange. Participants stay a minimum of 5 consecutive days to contribute to the artistic creations and to the daily organisation of life at the camp.

Chef Antoine Carteri from Gastronomica Luxembourg will be cooking for all the participants.

Nomadic Island is looking for members and foodsavers who are willing to help implement the anti-waste policy of Nomadic Island. Antoine has his own food providers, but we would like to integrate with delivery from foodsavers. We would be grateful to collaborate with some of you for the pick-ups and the delivery of the saved food to the Nomadic Island camp, which is situated at the Thillebierg football stadium (Rue de l’Hôpital, 4581 Differdange). 

The people who would collaborate with us could join the camp and its activities as participants of the project. They would then work together with the artists to create artworks and commit to our social experiment.

Please, find a flyer which briefly explains what it is about to participate in the Nomadic Island project. For more information on the project and the artists participating, please check the webpage of the Nomadic Island project.

Foodsavers and Foodsharing members who want to take part in the project and help us with saved food will not need to pay any participation fee.

13 people on a bike tour visit the FP Lintgen

photo by Ekkehart Schmidt

The Foodsharing Point Lintgen had a group of 13 people come and visit on a bike tour ( with velosophie https://velosophie.lu/de/) as part of their annual outing with etika -a non-profit association founded in 1996 who aims to promote alternative finance and thus support the transformation towards a more sustainable world – https://etika.lu/ . Their focus this year was food waste and so they came to visit our FP to learn more about FSL and how they can take part in reducing food waste. It was a glorious morning, the sun was shining and it was a success for everyone involved. After some ‘saved food’ refreshments and stocking up from the fridge in the FP for their picnic lunch, they cycled off to Kass Haff and Naturata.

Advent Window at Foodsharing Point Lintgen

Foodsharing Point Lintgen, Photo by Hannah Proffitt-Perchard, December 2021

On December 1st, the Foodsharing Point in Lintgen revealed their Advent Window. The event was organised by the commune of Lintgen over the 24 days of Advent.

The window decorations were lovingly crafted by local children and all the lights and Christmas decorations were donated to us by SIVEC recycling centre.

The event was a team effort, and everyone had an enjoyable evening sharing saved food and drinking warm spiced apple juice made with local fruit!

It was a special occasion to connect with people from the village. It gave us the opportunity to explain and demonstrate how the Foodsharing Point works, discuss some common misconceptions, and spread the message to help fight food waste in Luxembourg.

Come to see our Advent Window – our window is lit up every night from 18:00 to 21:00 and you can also visit the Foodsharing Point.

“Take what you need, share what you can, fighting food waste together!”

Thank you, from the Foodsharing Point team Lintgen

EYE 2021

United Against Food Waste: Making sure food ends up in people’s stomachs

Foodsharing Luxembourg participated at the European Youth Event (EYE) at the European Parliament in Strasbourg with thousands of young people from all over the European Union and beyond with a workshop where participants came up with ideas on how to tackle food loss and food waste.

Thank you! That is what “United Against Food Waste” stands for!

Our workshop took place on Saturday, October 9, 2021, from 14:00 to 15:00

Picture by Eunice Sánchez González

Results from the workshop

We divided up the workshop participants into 5 groups. Each group was dealing with one of the following topics: food loss, food service, retail, household. Only the last topic – household – was treated by two groups as we had to split it up due the huge interest. Here the top 3 political demands of each group are listed.

Food loss

  1. Increase youth education about how to value food, how to prevent food waste and how to reduce wasteful tendencies
  2. Optimise food production with scientifically proven solutions
  3. Open more channels for redistribution, e.g. special stores for overproduction or for unconventional looking vegetables

Food services

  1. Make food waste visible by forcing food services to publish their food waste production and to quantify the GHG emissions of their food offered
  2. Make donating unsold surplus mandatory and fund organisations that work with food leftovers
  3. Include food waste solutions in climate policies

Retail

  1. Simplify the expiration law and ban throwing away food
  2. Remove all legal barriers to sell expired but still edible food and fund stores that do sell them
  3. Force retail businesses to inform their customers about their food waste

Household 1

  1. Make consumers reflect on their consumption
  2. Support consumers by instructing them on how to prepare and conserve food at home
  3. Introduce food waste regulations for stores selling food

Household 2

  1. Educate consumers about food waste
  2. Make consumers aware of secondary uses
  3. Introduce penalties for food being wasted

We will continue to work with these and all the other ideas for political demands in our upcoming political work activities. Stay tuned!

Thanks to all the workshop’s organisers, facilitators and participants!

First Foodsharing Point opened

Picture by Daniel Waxweiler

Foodsharing Luxembourg is proud to announce the opening of their first Foodsharing Point! A Foodsharing Point is a public place to share food from private to private person and usually consists of a fridge and a shelf. You can take what you want, and you can put inside what you do not need. You find it at the shop Naturwelten, 7 rue Auguste Charles, in Bonnevoie, in Luxembourg City.

Thanks to Naturwelten for providing us with the place and to Frères des Hommes for providing us with a fridge!