As a child, I was often told to think of "starving Africans" when I held back at the dinner table. Forty years on, world hunger is still a major issue, but what gets less coverage is the number of Australians who go to bed hungry.

The sad fact is that while these Australians go hungry, food markets, supermarkets and food companies throw away huge amounts of perfectly edible food. Fortunately, there are a number of food relief organisations that are working to minimise this problem.

I recently visited Second Bite who collects surplus food from food markets and distribution centres. Operating from a modern warehouse that's rented to them for $1 a year, they distribute this raw fresh food to community groups and people in need. In 2011, this Melbourne-based organisation collected and distributed 1,000,000 kgs of fresh food. That's enough to provide over 5 million meals to Australians that desperately need such help.

OzHarvest was established in November 2004 and has become the much needed link between excess food in the community and those in need.

OzHarvest rescues food daily by collecting high quality perishable food that would otherwise be thrown away by corporate offices, delis, restaurants and caterers. They deliver it to 148 charities which provide meals for Sydney, Canberra, Newcastle, Adelaide and Brisbane's homeless and vulnerable.

Since 2002, FareShare has been collecting quality food from Melbourne businesses and transforming it into healthy, nutritious meals in their own kitchen. Providing meals free-of-charge to over 100 community service organisations, they also redistribute a large quantity of uncooked food directly to local charities.

In 2008 FareShare rescued 280 tonnes of food from 80 businesses, and 1,000 volunteers helped make and give away 560,000 meals.

The largest and best known food relief charity in Australia is Foodbank. It's often referred to as the pantry of the welfare sector, with warehouses in five states and seven regions.
Like the others, Foodbank acts as a conduit. They distribute the food and grocery industry's surplus and donations to 1800 welfare agencies, who in turn get the food into the mouths of Australians who would otherwise go hungry.

in 2011 Foodbank distributed 21 million kilograms of donated food. That's the equivalent of around 75,000 meals per day. 
The Foodbank story makes common sense. Apart from feeding people who would otherwise go hungry, the food industry's partnership with Foodbank saves millions of kilograms of good food from ending up in landfill.

We need to ensure that food charities get as much of the food industry's leftovers as possible. That is one of the key aims of this campaign.

But what makes no sense to me is that food charities often struggle for funding. That has to change.

Written by Jon Dee