NPR Report: Food Bank Shortages Lead To Innovation

Food banks around the country are trying to keep their shelves stocked as more people in the U.S. struggle to get enough to eat. Increasingly, that means finding new ways to salvage food that would otherwise go to waste.

One innovation is being tested at the Second Harvest Food Bank of Northeast Tennessee. In a back room at the food bank's warehouse in Gray, Tenn., dented and crushed cans containing everything from green beans to beets are piled high on a counter.

In the past, these cans all would have been thrown out, because no one knew whether bacteria had slipped through a crack, spoiling the contents.

But Scott Kinney, who's in charge of finding food supplies for the food bank, says that might be about to change.

He puts several damaged cans into a box-shaped machine with a clear lid. It's a vacuum packaging machine — the kind usually used to seal food in plastic.

"Right now it's setting up the vacuum," he says, as the machine motor starts to hum. "You can watch; the cans will move a little bit as the vacuum gets to its highest pressure point."

The cans vibrate, then puff up like little balloons as the machine sucks out all the air in the chamber. They return to normal when the machine stops.

www.npr.org/2011/06/25/137375088/food-bank-shortages-lead-to-innovation