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https://reasonstobecheerful.world/community-fridges-hunger-climate-change/>
"Dan Zauderer and his in-laws had eaten plenty of pizza one evening in early
October, and they still had seven slices left. What to do? “Well, we could just
chuck it,” Zauderer thought. Instead, he and his fiancée wrapped the slices in
plastic wrap, slapped labels on them with the date, and walked the leftovers a
little more than a block down the road to a refrigerator standing along 92nd
Avenue in New York City’s Upper East Side.
That fridge is one among many “community fridges” across the country that
volunteers stock with free food — prepared meals, leftovers, and you name it.
Zauderer had helped set a network up in New York City during the pandemic as a
way to reduce waste and fight hunger. The idea came about when he was a middle
school teacher looking to provide short-term help to students whose families
couldn’t afford food. He stationed the first fridge in the Bronx in September
2020. That one, the Mott Haven Fridge, was hugely popular, and it motivated
Zauderer to expand. Since then, he has helped plug in seven more fridges in the
Bronx and Manhattan, including the one where he dropped off his leftover pizza.
“It just blossomed into way more than I ever could have expected,” said
Zauderer, who now works full-time at Grassroots Grocery, a food-distribution
nonprofit he co-founded in New York.
It’s not just Zauderer’s project that has blossomed. Community fridges first
cropped up a decade ago in a few isolated spots around the globe, then spread
across the United States right after the pandemic started in 2020, when supply
chains were crumbling, food prices were rising, and families across the country
were struggling to find meals. At the time, the fridges were viewed as a
creative response to an urgent need. But when the pandemic subsided, it became
clear that the refrigerators — sometimes called freedges, friendly fridges, and
love fridges — were more than a fad. Today, nonprofits and mutual aid groups
are overseeing hundreds of fridges that bolster access to food in cities from
Miami to Anchorage, Alaska."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
