"6.7 MILLION TONNES: WE HAVE BIN THROUGH A LOT"
A group exhibition about food waste and food justice in the UK
Art Exchange, University of Essex, May 2022
According to the Waste and Resources Action Programme, 6.7 million tonnes of food are wasted every year in the UK’s households, the equivalent of 15 billion meals. Food connects us, nourishes culture, and is deeply embedded with everyone's identity. However, while the UN has declared an “international hunger emergency” , one third of the world’s food is thrown away during production, processing, distribution, retail, and consumption, and the food industry is responsible for more than 30% of total climate emissions. The promise of abundance and access to any food anywhere in the capitalist world, and the normalisation of the throwaway culture have led us to a wasteful lifestyle, from the bins filled to the brim in the campus’ kitchens to the plastic of our coffee cups and sandwich wrappers.
“6.7 Million Tonnes: We Have Bin Through A Lot” presents itself as a gathering of pieces which document and archive aesthetic, social, and political-driven projects, drawn from intimate experiences of the food system. Through mixed-media and research-based artworks from eight British and international artists, the exhibition highlights the challenges of food justice today: Yiming Mao, Itamar Gilboa, Sean Roy Parker, explores the largescale impacts of food waste on our daily environment: Cat Coulter, Klaus Pichler, and showcases practical solutions towards a sustainable and resilient food system based on care and recycling: Liz Elton, Björn Steinar Blumenstein, Lor-K.
PUBLIC PROGRAM
FOOD WASTE ON CAMPUS
Thursday 5, Art Exchange
A talk with Somdip Dey, a PhD student in Computer Science and Electronic Engineering in the University of Essex and co-founder and CEO of Nosh Technologies, which provides automated AI powered food management application - nosh, to help users reduce food waste in the household (www.somdipdey.co.uk) ; Ethics Food, the food supplier across the University's Colchester Campus; and Katy Wheeler, senior lecturer in Sociology in the University of Essex focusing on fairtrade movement and recycling in comparative contexts, exploring how these different consumer practices generate distinctive moral economies.
HOW BAD ARE BANANAS?
Thursday 12, Square 5
An interactive game about food carbon footprint and tips to reduce food waste with Essex Sustainability Team.
FOOD JUSTICE IN THE UK
Thursday 19, Online
A talk with Dany Steele from Bennison Farm (https://bennisonfarm.co.uk/), a small Organic market garden in Thorrington near Colchester providing what can grow on the farm to people with in a 10 mile radius so the produce is 100% seasonal and local with very low food miles (some of their vegetables will be used by Sean Roy Parker to produce his ferments); and Emma Campbell a research Fellow in Architecture in the School of Natural and Built Environment at Queen's University, Belfast, who hold a PhD in Supermarkets and worked with Greg Keeffe on the Bin Burger Project about food justice in London.