Category: Design

Dishing Up A More Sustainable Food System

By: Karen Hallisey

What and how we eat impacts the environment. At UCLA, several campus organizations, many led by students, plus a local group, are dedicated to doing something about this and improving food security for their fellow Bruins.

First, a little background to whet the appetite on how food and sustainability are intertwined. Food production and consumption have environmental impacts. Both our choices about which food to eat and which vendors to patronize have associated carbon emissions and waste footprints.

In terms of food choices, consider options that are plant-based, locally sourced and seasonal. As for food product vendors, look for ones with paper, metal or glass packaging that will be recycled or else can be reused. Avoid options with lots of plastic packaging. As for uneaten items discarded into the garbage? Left to the landfill, they lead to harmful methane emissions, so look into what options you have to compost your food scraps and waste. The economic and social part of the food sustainability equation concerns fair trade and labor practices for agriculture workers — as well as supporting local farmers — and ensuring all people have access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food.

Here are some of the campus and local groups combatting food loss and helping.

Bruin Dine

Founded in 2018, this student-run organization aims to bridge the gap between food waste and food insecurity by recovering food from UCLA’s dining halls that would otherwise be thrown away, and redistributing it to campus and community members in need. Food recovery events occur multiple times a week each quarter, with diners asked to bring their own containers and utensils, further greening this UCLA food recovery effort.

Community Programs Office Food Closet
Supporting students by providing free food to anyone experiencing hunger and/or struggling to attain food due to financial hardships, they additionally host a harvest distribution — open to the entire UCLA community — to bring Bruins free produce gleaned from markets across Los Angeles.

Jane B Semel HCI Community Garden
Located atop UCLA’s Sunset Canyon Amphitheater is a space comprised of raised garden beds and an assortment of fruit trees. Part of the Semel Healthy Campus Initiative Center, the garden provides an on-campus space for the Bruin community to grow healthy food, learn about urban gardening practices, and enjoy free, fresh produce.

Plant Futures at UCLA

This professional network for students is dedicated to promoting a plant-centric food system that addresses the climate crisis and food security. The initiative is focused on education and awareness of the social justice, health benefits, and environmental sustainability aspects of sticking to fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds, and more and building a community of Bruins committed to a plant-centric future. They also host plant-based potlucks.  

UCLA Basic Needs Center at Strathmore
The center supports members of the campus community with several programs to provide free of charge essentials, including food resources. This branch located at 555 Westwood Plaza, Room 106, runs a monthly mobile market in collaboration with nonprofit organization Student LunchBox to distribute free fruits, vegetables, canned goods, and other groceries to any UCLA student.

Teaching Kitchen

Run through UCLA Recreation, the kitchen is an educational, interactive space to meet the needs of Bruins in areas including nutrition education, food insecurity, and community engagement. Programs include plant-based cooking workshops, a Meatless Monday series of classes, and recipe resources, emphasizing healthy and affordable options that are delicious.

Westwood Food Cooperative

The neighborhood cooperative has an affordable and accessible CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) food program that supplies locally grown food to UCLA’s student body. 

Cheers to a more sustainable meal at your table — with no scraps left behind!

Sorting it out with UCLA’s Zero Waste Manager

By Karen Hallisey

Sustainability doesn’t have to be messy — even when you are talking trash. Inching closer to the start of the academic year, when the campus population peaks and the litter piles up, is a good time to reintroduce the goal to divert 90% of the university’s waste from landfills and welcome someone new to oversee this initiative.

Zero waste at UCLA focuses on reducing, reusing, recycling, and composting. Directing this diversion is Jade Goegebuer, the program’s new manager. In this role, Jade, a recycling and resource management expert, leads waste management efforts, engages Bruins to throw away as little as possible, and furthers the phase out of single-use plastics on campus.

Jade has always favored broad green strokes. An avid painter with artistic credentials and gardener who frequents national parks, she breaks down how waste minimization on campus works.

Centralized bins have three streams: recycle (hard plastics, clean paper, glass, and metals); compost (food and liquids, soiled paper products); and landfill (snack wrappers, plastic utensils and straws, and Styrofoam).

Jade explains the big thing is to sort trash correctly so that items get to the waste hauler uncontaminated. For example, recyclables with food on them that should go in the composting stream.

Breaking free from plastic is also a big deal. UCLA’s single-use policy is about transitioning away from plastic bags in retail and dining locations, replacing single-use plastic food service items with only reusable or locally compostable alternatives, and switching to aluminum, glass, or paper water and beverage bottles.

“Our plastic reduction goal is one of the strictest in the UC system,” said Jade.

What difference does zero waste make? A heaping load!

A backpack full of trash — 2 pounds precisely, is generated every second at UCLA. That’s more than a million pounds of waste each year.

The breakdown of materials in landfills releases methane, a greenhouse gas that traps more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. Sending less waste to landfills can lead to a significant reduction in these harmful emissions.

As for encouraging Bruins to get on board with zero waste, Jade emphasizes being mindful.

“If you know you come to campus every Monday to stay and study, use a reusable cup. Right now, there’s a dine-in mug program at Kerckhoff Coffee House,” said Jade.

And there’s conscious consumption: Do you need to buy something, and does it have to be brand new, or can you borrow it from someone? UCLA has a Surplus Stop with new-to-you items like furniture, electronics, school and office supplies, home goods, and more available.

Finally, she suggests talking to your friends, family, and fellow Bruins!

“It’s often noted that some people interested in sustainability are really engaged. But there are also people not aware of what can be done. Speak out and share what you know,” said Jade.

To learn more, visit the Zero Waste website and follow Zero Waste UCLA on Instagram.

Growing impact: UCLA reports gains 1 year into comprehensive sustainability plan

UCLA introduced its first campuswide sustainability action plan during Earth Month 2022. One year later, a broad range of initiatives outlined by the plan is demonstrating progress.

Overall, the initiatives have further embedded responsible stewardship into the campus’s operations, education and research, as well as into the ways UCLA engages with the community.

UCLA established an office dedicated to sustainability directives 15 years ago, and members of the campus community have long understood the institution’s role, as a public university, in advancing climate action and leading the way toward a more sustainable future. But the sustainability plan set concrete targets across a range of measures, from energy conservation to biodiversity to waste management.

Read the full story on UCLA Newsroom.

Share Your Feedback on UC’s Climate Policy

a small handmade model of planet earth with googly eyes holds a sign that says there is no planet b

The most recent IPCC report, compiled by hundreds of scholars and approved by the representatives of 195 countries, clearly states: “There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all (very high confidence).”

As the climate crisis worsens, the University of California is evolving its response with an updated climate policy that shifts from a carbon neutrality strategy that relies on offsets towards a strategy of direct decarbonization that will require fully transforming campus energy infrastructure. 

UC’s Climate Change Working Group is collecting feedback on the draft policy update from stakeholders across the UC system. After incorporating feedback the policy will go to the UC Sustainability Steering Committee for approval in May.

Review the Draft Climate Policy then complete this feedback form. Comments must be received by April 7. All Bruins are encouraged to provide their feedback.

To learn more, watch this webinar recording with background and detail on the proposed policy. 

Bruins are also invited to join an upcoming event on April 12, hosted by UCLA Law, “Make or Break: Transforming U.S. Infrastructure to Meet Climate Goals”, along with other sustainability activities planned for Earth Month in April. Check UCLA Sustainability’s calendar to stay informed of upcoming happenings and sign up to receive our newsletter. The newsletter published monthly features news, events, and opportunities and is expanded with extra weekly content for Earth Month.

It’s Time We Break Up with Plastics

By Karen Hallisey

There’s an unhealthy relationship you may be in, that’s affecting not just you, but others.

The toxic relationship we’re talking about that has gone on for too long and needs to end is the one with single-use plastics — especially when there are so many new, better, and more sustainable products out there!

Single-use plastics items are wrappers and packaging, straws and other food service ware, and bags. They are one of the most abundant (and avoidable) kinds of waste, that come with a steep environmental price.

Plastic junk used for just a moment can take hundreds of years to decompose. Bruins can help by leading the way to a plastic-free future and stopping this pressing environmental issue that threatens the health of humans, wildlife, and our natural spaces.

UCLA has already begun transitioning away from plastic bags in retail and dining locations, also removing single-use plastic foodservice items and beverage bottles. The Single Use Plastics Policy aims to eliminate single-use plastics from campus.

Individual choices to avoid single-use plastic also add up. A single swap, like purchasing a reusable water bottle, can spare the environment hundreds of plastic bottles each year.

Two more tips for ridding your life (and our campus community) of single-use plastics for good include:

· Reducing and reusing before recycling

· Applying for the Green Events and Green Office certifications

Learn more at sustain.ucla.edu/zero-waste and follow @zerowasteucla on Instagram.

UCLA Expands Dedication to Protecting Biodiversity, Joins International Nature Coalition

By Karen Hallisey

Against the backdrop of the biggest global summit for living things, the United Nations Biodiversity Conference, UCLA has pledged to further help Earth’s animals and plants by joining the new Nature Positive Universities Alliance.

Created jointly by the UN Environment Programme and the University of Oxford, the alliance aims to spur the world’s higher education institutions to do more work that halts and reverses damage to natural areas so species and ecosystems can flourish. Being “nature positive” encompasses everything a university does, from its teaching and research endeavors to the operations that keep it running.

“Universities have an important role in addressing the global biodiversity crisis through research and teaching, and also through the hands-on opportunity for restoration and access to nature on our campuses,” said Nurit Katz, UCLA’s chief sustainability officer.

Read the full story on UCLA Newsroom.