Food comes full circle at FIU's new sustainable garden

Parents often demand “Finish the food on your plate” before letting their children get up from the table. That’s a common directive to get kids to eat, but there’s also an underlying concern about food waste, a real problem in the United States and around the world.

About one-third of food produced for human consumption, or about 1.3 billion tons, is wasted every year, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Now, FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality & Tourism Management, the College of Arts, Sciences and Education Earth and Environment Department, and the FIU Facilities Department are coming together to find a solution at the re-imagined FIU Living Lab, a hands-on, sustainable garden and Food Circularity Lab on the Biscayne Bay Campus.

“We waste so much food. We need to reduce food waste and keep it out of landfills that generate greenhouse gases,” said John Buschman, a hospitality professor and co-director of the Chaplin School’s Global Sustainable Tourism Bachelor of Arts degree. 

Buschman has been a leader for years in trying to combat food waste through food rescue at hotels and mega events like the Super Bowl and at the Chaplin School’s very own South Beach Wine & Food Festival or SOBEWFF®. 

“We started the garden with food scraps from the SOBEWFF® Green Team,” he said. The Green Team, made up of more than 500 FIU students, is a yearly effort at the premiere wine and gourmet food festival to help make mega and large-scale events more sustainable. The Green Team works with a company called Renewable to turn rescued food into compost. “We brought back the scraps three months ago, which included 25,000 pounds of food waste from SOBEWFF® and used that to start our new raised beds here,” said Buschman.

FIU's Living Lab will support food circularity initiatives at the BBC Campus.

The new garden collaboration is designed to take food waste from all Chaplin School events and its Wine Spectator Restaurant Management Lab, compost them, then return them to the table at both future events and FIU’s only student-run and award-winning restaurant, the FIU Bistro, which is open to the public on Wednesdays during the fall and spring semesters.

During a ribbon cutting in early July, tomatoes, zucchini and green beans were planted.

Six raised compost stalls dedicated to growing fruits and vegetables.

The garden features six raised compost beds, the food circularity lab, a section for ornamental plants that will eventually be re-planted for campus beautification and used for carbon capture, and eventually a food forest, where self-sustaining edible plants and trees will be available to faculty and staff.

“Thanks to our collaboration, we’re creating a circular system,” said Jesse Blanchard, director of the Living Lab and a CASE Earth & Environment professor. “We collect food waste and turn it into fertilizer for our gardens, closing the cycle and lowering the Living Lab’s carbon footprint,” he added.

From Farm to Bar

In addition, wilted or expired garnishes used at events hosted by student clubs or guilds within the Chaplin School’s Bacardi Center of Excellence also get composted. For the past year, the Bartender’s Guild has taken their food waste to MMC to compost and plant in an herb garden there. Now with the Living Lab at BBC, Professor Buschman and the students save the 25-mile carbon footprint journey between campuses and more students in the guilds can be involved in the garden. In fact, the food circularity project has resulted in fresh sage, mint and basil being used as drink garnishes by at hospitality events.

FIU Hospitality students will use herbs from the garden to garnish drinks at their events.

The garden is now open Tuesday and Thursdays from 9am until 1pm. One of the most unique pieces of the sustainable garden is that professors will include the operations into their curriculum starting this fall. Students from Professor Buschman’s Social Responsibility class, Professor Blanchard’s Earth and Environment class, a Chaplin School Food Production class, plus four student interns will work together to maintain the garden for future generations to come.

“I’m not a gardener, I’m just an instigator,” said Buschman.

**Students interested in getting involved with the Living Lab, please DM @FIUHospitality on Instagram.