USA: After Halloween, thousands of pumpkins end up in landfills

On the last day of October every year, the lawns in front of American homes are decorated—along with skeletons, ghosts, and other terrible decorations— Millions of pumpkins, often hollow and carved, they serve as lanterns. Although the effect can be impressive, it is not long lasting – the squash deteriorates rapidly and as a result, in the following days, ends up on a large scale in landfills, where they emit greenhouse gases.

Every year this ritual wakes up Alarm from environmentalists, food banks and social activists. precise Halloween food waste Unknown, but according to statistics reported by The Atlantic, about 600,000 people end up in landfills every year. Tons of pumpkins.

According to Gary Oppenheimer, president of Ample Harvest, Americans’ awareness of this is growing, although the volume of waste remains enormous.

Every year right after that Halloween We are recording an increasing number of visits to our website and apps to offer our pumpkins – The activist notes.

The organization operates in all 50 states, making unwanted but edible donations gourd For food banks and local stores. There are more and more of them.

Under good storage conditions gourd It has a long life, but there is one condition: it must not be touched by a knife, and it must not be pierced Oppenheimer says.

This requirement eliminates many pumpkins used for Halloween. Fortunately, there are other options as well. SCARCE collects and allocates “used” vegetables Fertilizer. In this way, 9-10 tons of pumpkins capture water and nutrients to the ground. There are also smaller local initiatives.

My friend has a goat farm, so we teamed up with her to take everyone there gourd from the neighborhood. Goats handle it without a problem – Sarah Weidman of Chesterfield says: Virginia. It is unfortunate that so much is wasted because squash is a wonderful vegetable that can be used to make so many things – He adds.