Low-income Americans need more help getting enough to eat, but not much of the food retailers that sell groceries could potentially donate is given away. Only 13% of it ends up at food banks, according to a 2026 report produced by ReFED, a nonprofit that studies and tries to prevent food waste.
The rest is composted; turned into animal feed, biofuels and other industrial products; sold at a deep discount shortly before its use-by date; or disposed of in landfills and incinerators.
