Dining Services Recognized for Exemplary Practices

Congratulations to Dining Services which, thanks to its exemplary practices, will lead two subcommittees for the UC Food Initiative.

After all 10 campus’ systems were reviewed, UC Merced’s Dining Services was asked to lead two subcommittees – waste reduction and local procurement, facilitating small growers’ ability to do business with the campus and supply fresh, local food.

There are 23 subcommittees focusing on topics such as student experiential learning; establishing food pantries to promote food security on campuses; policy change; designing a systemwide lecture series on healthy students and healthy communities; mining existing data on food availability and security for UC students; mining existing data for insights on California agriculture and response to climate; and many more.

The initiative’s goal is to teach the world to sustainably and nutritiously feed itself, by drawing on the wide range of resources and expertise available at UC campuses. The effort will incorporate everything from agriculture and medicine to how we leverage our collective buying power and dining practices to incentivize desirable policies and practices.

The initiative will identify best practices and share them widely; use the power of UC research to help people and communities access safe, affordable and nutritious food while sustaining our natural resources; and deploy UC research to shape, affect and drive policy discussions around food issues at the local, statewide, national and international levels.