Green News

Whether it’s the buffet-style meals, the community atmosphere or the fact that some of our food is locally grown, the dining halls make the College what it is. Sometimes, however, when we have to wait in line for 25 minutes to get food or we arrive late and all that’s left is baked haddock, we lose sight of how lucky we are to have three cooked meals a day just waiting for us whenever we want to eat them. Whereas some colleges make students pay for every item they put on their tray, we can go back for seconds, thirds, fourths and more — even to two dining halls for the same meal. This system has become so ingrained in our collective minds that we barely stop to think about how much we take and how much we actually eat.

The SGA Environmental Affairs Committee is trying to change that. If you ate dinner in one of the dining halls last night, you might have noticed that the routine was slightly different. Instead of passing your leftover food and plate over to the carousel immediately, you were asked to dump the remaining food in a bucket. Why? To raise the question: Am I eating what I’m taking?

Every day, students waste an immeasurable amount of food at the dining halls. Not only are we wasting resources, but we’re also going against Middlebury’s dedication to being a sustainable campus. The amount of food one person wastes per meal by the end of the day could equal a whole extra meal or two for some. It’s not only hunger and food we’re thinking about here, though. The irrigation water used globally to grow food that is wasted would be enough for the domestic needs of nine billion people. Ten percent of our country’s greenhouse gas emissions come from growing food that is never eaten. Wasting food is about something bigger than just ourselves, or even just Middlebury; it’s about our earth and our own future as human beings on it. While that is indeed a bold statement, we can, in fact, help ourselves out and this begins with the simple mantra: eat what you take.

Last night the SGA Environmental Affairs Committee challenged the student body to waste the least amount of food. The committee monitored five compost bins (one for each commons) adjacent to the exits of each dining hall.  Students dumped their leftover food waste into the appropriate compost bin as they exit. At the end of the night, the bins were weighed and Cameron Cup points were distributed to the Commons.

The main goal of this competition was to remind the student body of how privileged we are to have an "all you can eat, whenever you want plan." Our food may seem free, but there is, in fact, value connected to everything we eat — not simply value in the monetary sense, but also in greenhouse gas emissions.

The next time you go to the dining hall — or in fact, if you’re reading this in there right now — think about how much you’ll eat before you take it. Sometimes it’s doing the little things that can make a big difference.