The Invading Sea, Flashfood Prevents Food Waste, Soalliance.Org!

 THE INVADING SEA: FLORIDA AND THE CLIMATE CRISIS

When most people think of the invading sea they don’t think of that as a positive thing. In THIS case, it is. It’s a CLIMATE positive thing. The Invading Sea: Florida and the Climate Crisis is a collaboration of 26 Florida news organizations – 25 daily newspapers and WLRN Public Media, South Florida’s public radio station. The site features editorials from newspaper partners and opinion pieces by scientists, academics, activists and citizens interested in Florida and the threats posed by climate change.

The goal of the participating news organizations is to address the threat faced by Floridians from sea-level rise. Invading Sea wants to raise awareness, amplify the voice of the region and create a call to action that can’t be ignored. Like many media platforms, it has the familiar menu offerings: “in the news”; “editorials”; and “elections.” One interesting twist not found on most other news sites is called, “influencers.” Influencers is a collection of material and Viewpoints from people in government, academia, business, civic and advocacy groups. 

Why does Florida’s Invading Sea matter to us? Because it’s a collaboration of 26 Florida news organizations – 25 daily newspapers and a South Florida public radio station that wants to raise awareness, amplify the voice of the region and create a call to action that can’t be ignored. It’s the right media platform for the moment. And because it’s a template that other U.S. states can adopt. And so too could states and provinces in other countries. 

DEEPER DIVE: The Invading Sea

FLASHFOOD: FOOD APP PREVENTS FOOD WASTE

Flashfood is a new food app out which gives its users access to groceries nearing their “best-by” date, and therefore have been deeply discounted. Flashfood is a Toronto-Canada based company, created to help people save money and more importantly, to fight against food waste.

 When food reaches its “best-by” date, grocers are obligated to toss it. Most grocers globally are not aligned with a food composting company, so most old food gets tossed into a landfill, where it rots, creating methane gas, which is 20-80x a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.  In other words, rotting food in landfills contributes greatly to climate change.

According to National Geographic, if all food waste globally were a single country, it would be the third largest emitter of GHGs behind China and the United States. And that’s why Flashfood matters to us. Its goal is to drastically reduce food waste by connecting its users with grocery stores and restaurants that have unsold good approaching their “best-by” date. 

Flashfood was founded in 2016 by Josh Domingues after—according to his website—he received a phone call from his sister about her having to toss $400 worth of food. Here’s how the app works. Using geolocation, it finds discounted foods near you. You choose what items you want, and then you pay for the food in the app. The food is then delivered to your door. 

Since 2016, Flashfood claims to partner with over 1,400 grocery stores and restaurants in the US and Canada. It also claims to have diverted over 50 million pounds of food from landfills and saved shoppers over $120 million. The savings aren’t just on the shoppers’ side. Restaurants and grocery stores are able to recover a portion of the billions of dollars lost to food waste by selling it at a discount. Kind of a win-win-win—for shoppers, for food retailers, and definitely for the planet.

DEEPER DIVE: Flashfood, Harvard, Food Waste

SOALLIANCE.ORG

The Sustainable Ocean Alliance (SOA) activates young people, develops and implements innovative solutions, and mobilizes an ocean workforce to restore the health of the ocean in our lifetime.

Its founder, Daniela, was just 19 years old and According to her bio, a student at Georgetown University in 2014.  The Alliance has since cultivated the world’s largest network of next-gen leaders, entrepreneurs, advocates, mentors, and partners—all working to create solutions for the largest challenges facing our ocean, according to its website.

Also according to its website, it has nurtured over 6K leaders in 165 countries, supported 45 startups, administered over 200 microgrants and developed mentors in 24 nations. The Sustainable Ocean Alliance focuses on three flagship program areas, Ocean Solutions Accelerator, Ocean Leadership, and Microgrants. The Ocean Solutions Accelerator helps entrepreneurs launch a for-profit ocean solution for a sustainable blue economy by providing funding, mentorship, and other critical resources to scale their ventures and amplify their impact.

Ocean Leaders take action that improves ocean health in furtherance of UN Sustainable Development Goal 14—Life Below Water. And microgrants and mentorship target project leaders who are under 36 and addressing critical ocean issues with grassroots, collaborative approaches. Some of the microgrants go to Blue Carbon, fisheries, as well as ecosystem & species conservation programs.

So why does the Sustainable Ocean Alliance matter to us? Because hope plays a key role in climate repair. And it’s working. SOA recently received over $15M in funding to support its goals.

DEEPER DIVE: SOA, Forbes 30-under-30, SDSG 14, Palm Beach Post