So when I was a kid my family made use of food banks. Now that I'm doing better in life I give a cut of each paycheck to my local food bank (The Alameda County Food Bank). I don't feel too bad about ordering from Imperfect Produce, it's convenient way to get produce delivered to your door, and I still wind up buying some things from the farmers market and co-op. On that note, it is good to know what consequences new business models have on the surrounding community.
> I don't feel too bad about ordering from Imperfect Produce, it's convenient way to get produce delivered to your door
Honest question: are there similarly convent ways to get produce delivered to your door that don't undermine the food banks' fresh food supply? If you can afford to pay for produce, why not pay for the produce that's traditionally been on the market?
I think this is a very narrow perspective. The situation around access to food has changed radically over the past 50 years or so, in the US and globally. Over that period, the human population has doubled, while the cost of food has actually dropped significantly. Although access to food in the US is sometimes still a problem, it is nowhere near the problem it was for our grandparents' generation.
Did you actually read the article linked? Imperfect Produce and similar operations divert food that otherwise would be bound for food banks and other sources of food assistance programs towards more affluent segments of the consumer market.
My parents spent a lifetime barely making ends meet as organic vegetable farmers, and will be living the rest of their retirement in what amounts to basic poverty.
Anything that increased their revenue on their hard work is a good thing. Asking them to give away otherwise sellable produce is simply asking for someone else to perform charity on your behalf. And if you work in tech you would be a (relatively) rich person asking some of the poorest to do so - which I find both immoral and despicable - since this attitude is so prevalent in these circles.
The moral thing to do if you care, is donate to the food bank or otherwise directly support charity - not asking someone else to do it on your behalf.
Yes, they found a way to give profit to farmers while still operating as a for-profit.
By reducing stuff that is not valuable to the farmer at all they are evil?
Food assistance programs take food that is otherwise unsaleable. Making more stuff saleable is how technology works. Considering we have a bustling market in recyclables, is that bad?
The marginal effect of 1 person buying ugly produce is that that set of produce does not get donated. In other words, a marginal decrease in inkind donations to foodbanks. This can be directly offset by a monetary donation.
