The Food to Hog program at Children’s Minnesota has now expanded to the Children’s Minnesota Business Campus.
“Our St. Paul campus was the first to participate in this composting program. Minneapolis followed suit,” said Stacey Johnson, support operations coordinator at Children’s Minnesota, “In November 2019, the Ronald McDonald House joined the program, as well.”
Through contracting with a local farmer, Children’s Minnesota campuses’ food waste gets hauled away and processed into animal feed so that food waste can still find a good and welcome home elsewhere. This type of composting is a viable waste reduction strategy and long-term benefits of the program will reduce incineration or landfill disposal costs for food scraps.
Food-to-animals organics recycling programs accept:
- Food prep waste
- Plate waste and food scraps from patient trays
- Unpackaged spoiled or outdated food
- Unpackaged frozen food
Food-to-livestock
With this program, local farms collect food scraps on-site. Before being fed to livestock, food scraps are cooked and processed to eliminate any harmful bacteria. For collection ease, participating farms provide businesses with lined plastic carts on wheels that they wash out and re-line after pick-up.
Barthold Farms, our partner based out of St. Francis, Minn., has been a family-owned and operated farm for over 30 years. They provide this cost-effective, environmentally-sustainable option throughout the Twin Cities and surrounding areas.
For more details on the program, please see the video from Hennepin County below.
Alexandra Rothstein