Forum Double Donation Campaign Engages with Recycling and Food Waste 

Michigan Sustainable Business Forum celebrated 10 years of food loss and waste reduction at the 2026 ReFED Food Waste Solutions Summit in Charlotte, NC last month.  The Summit brought together leaders from across the food system to dig into what it will actually take to reduce food waste at scale through stronger measurement, smarter policy, more effective food recovery, institutional foodservice strategies, packaging conversations, innovation, and practical partnerships.

Forum executive director Daniel Schoonmaker and Director of Education and Engagement Rose Spickler were joined by representatives from members ciclo organico, City of Ann Arbor, Meijer and Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, alongside Doubling Food Donation campaign leads Metro Food Rescue, Make Food Not Waste, Community Action House, and Goodwill Northern Michigan.  

Often credited for launching the national food waste movement, this was the 10th anniversary summit and the 10th anniversary of ReFED’s “Roadmap to Reduce U.S. Food Waste”, which set an ambitious vision for transforming the way America produces, manages, and thinks about food waste.  Later that year, the Forum launched its first dedicated food waste program, the Western Michigan Food Recovery Council later that year.

“The core conviction of this group to help food go to its best use creates an impact that is bigger than the food itself,” noted ReFED President Dana Gunders in her keynote address at the start of the first mainstage session of the 2026 ReFED Food Waste Solutions Summit.

Since then, the field has continued to grow, solutions have scaled, and momentum has built in ways both measurable and inspiring. 

For MiSBF, it was especially valuable to collaborate with regional and national partners aligned closely with the work we are advancing in Michigan through the Double Food Donation Campaign, campus food waste reduction efforts, sustainable food service product work, and broader food system collaboration.  (If you’re interested in learning more about any of these efforts, please reach out!)

A few reflections we are bringing home:

• Food waste solutions are most effective when they are practical, operational, and designed around the real constraints businesses, institutions, and food recovery organizations face.
• Measurement matters – but only when it helps organizations make better decisions, reduce waste, and improve outcomes.
• Policy is a powerful lever, but durable change depends on coalition-building, timing, persistence, and relationships.
• Food recovery continues to evolve, and Michigan has a major opportunity to strengthen the infrastructure, partnerships, and donor confidence needed to move more safe, nutritious surplus food to people.

The Forum’s participation in the summit was made possible by the Michigan Health Endowment Fund through its Attend/Present Scholarship.  The 2027 ReFED Summit will be held in Chicago. 

Organicycle Selected for Prestigious Food Waste Program

ReFED announced the newest cohort of grantees selected through its Catalytic Grant Fund, a first-of-its-kind initiative designed to provide flexible, risk-tolerant capital to food waste solutions with the potential for outsized climate impact. Grand Rapids-based composting service and compost facility Organicycle was announced as one of the program’s nine awardees.  

The latest cohort, Minimizing Methane Through Food Waste Solutions, focused on supporting solutions that address methane emissions in two critical areas: advancing food recycling infrastructure to keep organic waste out of landfills and reducing methane emissions across beef and dairy supply chains through innovative feed and waste-to-value solutions. Methane is responsible for roughly one-third of current global warming, and food waste is one of its largest and most overlooked drivers. 

Organicycle is pioneering a partnership model with Waste Management to co-locate composting operations at existing waste sites, reducing permitting friction and accelerating infrastructure buildout in regions like Michigan and Northern Indiana.

The Forum supported the application. 

Local Solutions Highlighted at Michigan Recycling Coalition Kalamazoo Conference

At Michigan Recycling Coalition’s 44th annual conference in Kalamazoo, the Forum was acknowledged by Meijer Senior Vice President Tina Dekker for recognizing Meijer as a 2025 Sustainable Business of the Year. Meijer’s leadership in sustainability has been described in four Forum case studies, including Cómo trabaja Meijer para reducir la pérdida y el desperdicio de alimentos, Cómo Meijer superó su objetivo de reducción de emisiones de carbono un año antes de lo previsto, Cómo lograr la circularidad a gran escala: la estrategia de reciclaje de Meijer, y Cómo Meijer lidera la adopción de infraestructura ecológica para aguas pluviales. All of these efforts and more were highlighted in the keynote address by Dekker. 

MRC breakout sessions featured the successes of Shiawassee Recycles, a new organization involving the Shiawassee Regional Chamber of Commerce, Resourceful Recycling, the Great Lakes Family of Companies, and other partners to build out recycling resources in the Great Lakes Bay area. In a panel session moderated by Brad Austin, Director of Business Development at Great Lakes Family of Companies, panelists described the unique and multifaceted approaches to sustainable materials management that are being implemented in the region. 

“This is a group that gets things done,” Austin said about Shiawassee Recycles. “They are results oriented.”