At Donald Trump’s EPA, efforts like Feed It Onward are part of the Freedom 250 initiative, which celebrates the people, businesses, and communities across this country who are stepping up to solve problems in practical ways.

It’s about highlighting what works and returning to a fundamental truth: Americans taking responsibility and making better use of what we already have. Some of the most practical changes are happening right at home, and that’s where EPA’s Feed It Onward partners come in.

Our Feed It Onward partners come in all shapes and sizes: from farms to small businesses, to community organizations, and more. But all of them share a common goal: reducing food waste. At the Trump EPA, protecting the environment and growing the economy are not binary choices.

Reducing food waste proves that every day. It helps families hold on to their money, contributes to creating healthy soils for producing our food, and makes better use of what we already have.

As part of International Compost Awareness Week (ICAW), EPA’s Feed It Onward Initiative is spotlighting partners making it easier to turn food waste into something beneficial. ICAW, recognized each May, highlights how simple actions like composting can turn everyday food scraps into valuable resources that support agriculture and reduce waste.

At home, participation is easy: before throwing out imperfect food or scraps, consider how they can be repurposed. Composting is an example of a simple, low-cost way to turn your food waste into soil-enriching nutrients.

In fact, composting and food repurposing are more convenient than ever, with Feed It Onward partners like Mill Industries and Denali working to make reuse even easier for households and businesses. Mill’s Food Recycler turns wet, messy food scraps into dry and odorless materials that can be used in the soil or even as animal feed.

Similarly, Denali, the nation’s largest organics recycler, works across the food supply chain to collect and transform unsold food and organic materials into compost, animal feed, and other reusable products, keeping valuable resources in motion rather than sending them to landfills.

In addition, Mill’s collaboration with Amazon and Whole Foods Market has brought its efforts into grocery stores, where food that would otherwise be thrown away can be processed into feed ingredients for the chickens that help supply those stores.

It’s a simple but powerful shift: food that once would have been wasted is now helping produce more food. Food isn’t something to throw away. Its value is ongoing and something worth using well.

Solving food waste isn’t one big decision. It’s a series of practical choices that become easier when better systems are in place.

At home, that can be as simple as using what you already have, getting a second meal out of something you might have tossed, or thinking twice before food ends up in the trash. Across millions of homes, those choices add up in a real way.

For businesses, that means designing systems to waste less in the first place, ordering more efficiently, reducing excess, and preventing waste before it starts. That’s a different way of thinking about the problem.

International Compost Awareness Week is a reminder — but it’s also an opportunity to look at something familiar in a different way. Because the solution isn’t complicated, it’s already part of our daily lives, and once more, Americans are starting to see the impact become real.

To learn more about Feed It Onward and the work being highlighted across the country, visit epa.gov/feeditonward.

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Kevin J. McOmber is Regional Administrator for the EPA’s Southeast Region.

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