This App Wants You To Share Your Leftovers To Fight Food Waste

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In the developed world, most of us buy much more food than we can eat. Or that we should eat – just think that more than one-third of Americans are considered to be obese. A lot of stuff gets thrown away: according to a report by the Natural Resources Defense Counciil, 40% of the food produced in the U.S. is lost in the journey from farm to fork to landfill. In Europe, a number of Web services and platforms, the most famous of which being FoodSharing.de (more than 43.000 subscribers only in Germany), are trying to tackle the food waste issue.

In the United States, farmers can use Cropmobsteror Food Cowboy to route surplus food to foodbanks and charities. Consumers, can use a smartphone application launched last Autumn by two guys from Seattle, Dan Newman and Bryan Summersett, called LeftOverSwap. The app works only for iOS – an Android version is underway – and it’s pretty straightforward to use. Those interested in sharing their leftovers just need to take a picture of them, fill in a title and description and post the result with the app, for other users to see.

037/366 (Photo credit: anokarina)

The developers claim to have some 10,000 users so far, in New York, London, San Francisco, Australia, and even China. “Many users request features that we’d love to include and are working on – co-founder Dan Newman tells me in an email – like user ratings, profiles, and more platforms. I love the first leftoverswapper’s reaction to picking up a bag of potato chips: “This is the best bag of chips I’ve had.”

Not everyone was happy with the application’s launch, anyway Food is a sensitive thing to deal with, and even before launch, LefOverSwap raised some eyebrows among San Francisco’s health officials, that warned developers that they could face huge fines, if they tried to sell food to the public without a licence.
Point is, LefOverSwap does not sell food; it only puts in touch those who have more then they can consume, with the those in need. Still, there are other concerns; primarily health related concerns.

Used food, especially easily perishable one, can easily become a source of illnesses: that’s why, for instance, Foodsharing.de doesn’t allow the sharing of eggs, raw meat and fish. The German service, to avoid legal problems, also asks members to sign a declaration to set donors free of the consequences of food they have ginve, There are no such limitations in LeftOverSwaps, and it’s not clear who would be considered legally responsible if something bad happens. “The legal responsibility- Newman says -  hasn’t been tested in any cases that we’ve found. However, there is a federal law, the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Act that protects those who give food to non-profits under good faith”.

LeftOverSwap does provide some general guidelines for its users. They are generally based on common sense and include things like: don’t give away any food that you wouldn’t eat yourself; don’t take any food without knowing how old it is and making sure it was kept in proper storage or properly prepare any food that you receive, like heating it to the proper temperature for a sufficient time, washing any produce, or brushing off any dust on cans.

Another aspect that distinguishes the service from its European counterparts (of which FoodSharing.de is the best known, but there are “competitors” in the UK, in Italy, in Finland and elsewhere), is that is run by a for-profit organization, although, according to Newman, this doesn’t imply that there’s a commercial interest behind the app. “While we may be a for-profit company – he says – that is strictly a legal term for us. We aren’t really looking to make money, and if we do begin to charge or display advertising, it will be just to cover the costs of running the business. The basic Leftoverswap will always remain free”.

A little bit of money, anyway, wouldn’t hurt, if only to expand the service across different platforms, add new features, and improve the current service. If there’s an investor out there willing to bet on the service, he’d be more than welcome, the founders say.