Episode 111: Climate Heroes - Saving Food in Uruguay

A college student in Uruguay finds a way to salvage food that would otherwise be thrown away. With the help of friends, he manages to not only provide healthier food options for vulnerable communities, but also fight climate change.

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Transcript

Martina: It was March, 2016 and 23-year-old Marcelo Sus had just started a small hummus and falafel delivery business in his hometown of Montevideo, Uruguay. For the first time, Marcelo went shopping at Mercado Modelo, the city’s giant fruit and vegetable market in search of fresh ingredients for his new business.

Marcelo: Era un lugar enorme con más de quinientos puestos de frutas y verduras y más de seis mil personas caminaban por ahí todos los días. Ver todo eso fue impresionante para mí.

Martina: Marcelo approached a puesto de verduras, a produce stand, and he noticed something unusual. On the floor next to the table, he saw a clear bag full of a dozen heads of cabbage, or repollos. Marcelo asked the vendor what he was going to do with them, and the vendor told him he was going to throw them out. People wouldn’t buy them because the outside leaves were wilted.

Marcelo: Él me dijo que no podía vender esos repollos porque estaban feos, pero a mí no me parecían feos. Le pregunté si me podía dar uno y él me dijo que sí. Entonces, le quité las partes feas con mis manos y, ¡sorpresa! El repollo estaba en perfecto estado.

Martina: As he made his way around the market, Marcelo saw that every stand had the same kind of so-called “ugly” fruit and vegetables, set aside to be thrown out. Marcelo was shocked. As someone who was passionate about the environment, el medioambiente, he knew that a big part of climate change was rooted in how badly we managed our resources, food in particular.

Marcelo: ¡No podía creerlo! En Uruguay hay mucha gente que no tiene nada que comer y hay mucha comida que va a la basura. Además, producir esa comida cuesta trabajo, tiempo y recursos naturales. Entonces pensé: “Si uso estos alimentos, puedo ayudar a las personas que les falta comida y, al mismo tiempo, proteger el medioambiente”.

Martina: Welcome, les damos la bienvenida to a special season of the Duolingo Spanish Podcast. I’m Martina Castro. This season we’re bringing you the stories of true climate heroes… Everyday people in the Spanish-speaking world, who bring their communities together to take on climate change.

As usual, the storyteller will be using intermediate Spanish and I’ll be chiming in for context in English. If you miss something, you can always skip back and listen again. We also offer full transcripts at podcast.duolingo.com.

A quick note about Uruguayan Spanish: you’ll hear that Marcelo pronounces his LLs and Ys as “sh,” like in the word “repollo,” he’ll say “repoSHo.” Also, similar to some other Spanish-speaking countries, the S is often aspirated. That means you'll hear an "h" sound rather than the typical “s” sound, so words like “puesto” will sound like “pueHto.”

Martina: Marcelo was born in Montevideo, Uruguay. Every Saturday, as a teenager, he attended a Jewish youth group. The group did a lot of community service, helping people without homes, personas sin hogar. That’s when Marcelo started to see the impact he could have on the world.

Marcelo: Una vez a la semana, cocinábamos y les llevábamos comida a las personas sin hogar. Fue una experiencia impresionante. En ese momento supe que quería hacer algo para cambiar la realidad de mi país.

Martina: In 2014, Marcelo enrolled in a university to get a degree in Development Design. His goal was to learn how to come up with real-world scenarios to better manage our resources, fight climate change, and break the cycle of poverty.

Marcelo: En esta carrera nos daban herramientas para desarrollar proyectos sociales, humanos y ambientales para las personas y comunidades. Yo estaba muy emocionado. Mi sueño era crear un proyecto para cambiar la vida de la gente y, además, ayudar al medioambiente.

Martina: At his university, Marcelo took a class on climate change. He learned that the United Nations food programme estimates that up to 8% of greenhouse gasses are the result of wasted food, alimentos desperdiciados.

Marcelo: Aprendí que cuando desperdiciamos alimentos, tiramos a la basura mucho más. También se desperdician los recursos que se usaron para producirlos, como la tierra, el agua y la energía.

Martina: Marcelo began to think of things in terms of their carbon footprint. It’s a way to measure the greenhouse gasses emitted by an individual, organization, event, or product.

Marcelo: Si tiramos un alimento directamente a la basura, ese alimento genera dióxido de carbono. Desperdiciar la comida es malo tanto para las personas que pasan hambre como para el cambio climático.

Martina: In 2016, while he was studying for his bachelor’s in design, Marcelo lived with his parents, but he wanted to become financially independent, so he launched a small food business, comenzó un pequeño negocio.

Marcelo: Me gustaba cocinar, así que decidí comenzar un pequeño negocio de hummus y falafel para vender comida a través de las redes sociales.

Martina: It was then that he went shopping at Mercado Modelo for the first time, and discovered that a lot of perfectly fine food was thrown out every day.

Marcelo: Cuando vi toda esa comida desperdiciada, no lo podía creer. Entonces, empecé a investigar sobre el tema otra vez.

Martina: The National Food Institute of Uruguay reports that more than 250,000 people suffer from food insecurity and lack access to healthy foods, which are often more costly.

Marcelo: Por esta razón, las familias más vulnerables compran alimentos ricos en carbohidratos, grasas y azúcares, porque son más baratos. Entonces hay muchas personas con problemas de nutrición y no tienen acceso a los alimentos necesarios para tener una vida saludable.

Martina: Marcelo also found out that every year, in Uruguay around 65% of fruits and vegetables are wasted in the stages of food production and distribution.

Marcelo: En la etapa de producción, muchos alimentos se desperdician por su forma, tamaño o color. Desafortunadamente, también se desperdician por producir demasiado y problemas con el almacenamiento.

Martina: A lot of food is lost in storage, el almacenamiento, and during distribution and sale. Food is often wasted because of poor handling or inadequate refrigeration. Sometimes the produce arrives too ripe, or bruised, making it unappealing for customers. When it’s not sold, it’s thrown away.

Marcelo: Finalmente, muchos alimentos se desperdician en nuestras casas porque se cocina gran cantidad de comida y luego se tira a la basura.

Martina: The UN estimates that the food wasted in Latin America would be enough to meet the food needs of 300 million people. But Marcelo also read that this wasted food generates 3.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide. Clearly, preventing food waste could significantly reduce carbon emissions.

Marcelo: Decidí hablar con mis compañeros de la universidad. Les dije que sería una buena idea usar esas frutas y verduras que, de otra manera, se iban a desperdiciar, porque mucha gente las necesitaba en los refugios. Pero, la verdad, yo no sabía si era posible.

Martina: A good friend agreed to work with him. First, they reached out to shelters, or refugios, to see if they would want the food. They found two shelters that were interested.

Marcelo: Un refugio era de personas mayores y otro de mujeres víctimas de la violencia. Mi amigo y yo llamamos para preguntarles si estaban interesados en recibir frutas y verduras gratis y, por supuesto, ¡dijeron que sí!

Martina: The next day, Marcelo woke up early, picked up his friend, and they went to Mercado Modelo together. As soon as they arrived, they went to speak with the market’s management.

Marcelo: Les dijimos que éramos estudiantes y que queríamos las frutas y verduras que iban a ser desperdiciadas para llevarlas a personas que no tenían comida. El gerente nos dijo que podíamos hablar con los vendedores.

Martina: Marcelo and his friend chose a few stands at random. They told the vendors about their project and asked them for the fruit and vegetables they had on the side that weren’t going to be sold.

Marcelo: La mayoría de los vendedores nos dijo que no. Muchos pensaban que no estábamos diciendo la verdad y que queríamos la comida para venderla en otro lugar. Fue frustrante, pero nuestro proyecto era importante, así que teníamos que continuar.

Martina: After several Mercado Modelo vendors rejected their idea, Marcelo and his friend kept trying. At the end of the day, they had managed to convince four vendors to give them the fruits and vegetables deemed too ugly to sell. So they took the discolored and misshapen produce and went back to Marcelo’s house.

Marcelo: Nos dieron lechugas, manzanas, peras, bananas y otras cosas. Lo primero que hicimos fue hacer una clasificación para entender por qué no las querían vender. Las lechugas tenían algunas hojas feas, así que se las quitamos y el resto estaba perfecto. Las manzanas tenían algunas partes negras, pero era solo un problema estético porque la fruta estaba buena.

Martina: Once they had sorted everything, they realized they had over 150 pounds of fruit and vegetables. That was enough to feed about 100 people for a day.

Marcelo: Pusimos todo en el auto y fuimos al refugio de mujeres. Hablamos con una señora muy amable que recibió las bolsas con mucha emoción. La señora nos dijo que era perfecto para ellas porque las frutas y verduras son bastante caras.

Martina: Then, they went to a retirement home. They brought them pears that the seller had thought were too ripe to sell.

Marcelo: Un hombre nos abrió la puerta y se puso muy contento cuando vio todas las bolsas. Nos dijo que las peras eran perfectas para los ancianos porque no podían comer cosas duras. ¡Es increíble pensar que iban a tirar toda esa comida a la basura! Ellos nos dieron las gracias y nosotros estábamos felices porque sentíamos que habíamos hecho algo importante.

Martina: Marcelo went home and, again, started to think. He felt like there was more to be done. He knew there were more fruit and veggies, and also more folks to feed. Those first two experiences had left him feeling inspired.

Marcelo: Yo pensaba: “Tenemos que ayudar a más personas y, al mismo tiempo, ayudar con la sustentabilidad del medio ambiente”. Yo quería hacer crecer este proyecto.

Martina: Marcelo realized he could create an NGO, una ONG, that, in addition to helping people, worked to advance environmental sustainability.

Marcelo: Esa era la respuesta: crear una ONG con una misión social y medioambiental. ¡Era perfecto!

Martina: He named the project “Red de Alimentos Compartidos,” the Shared Food Network — or Re-Dal-Co, a shortened version of the name in Spanish. Redalco started making a name for itself. More volunteers wanted to help fight hunger and global warming, el calentamiento global. Soon, several organizations got in touch about receiving donations.

Marcelo: Nos empezaron a mencionar en los medios de comunicación, así que usamos esa oportunidad para tener un impacto más grande. Nosotros sabíamos que el mayor desperdicio de alimentos ocurría en los hogares, y de ahí sale la mayoría de los gases que generan el calentamiento global. Por esta razón, decidimos publicar una guía con instrucciones y consejos para intentar reducir el desperdicio de alimentos.

Martina: Marcelo was determined to make people understand the importance of not wasting food in their own homes and how this was an important thing they could do to help curb climate change.

Marcelo: Algunos de estos consejos son: planificar las compras; comprar solamente los alimentos necesarios; elegir frutas y verduras de diferentes tamaños e imperfectas; guardar correctamente los alimentos y congelar productos frescos.

Martina: Marcelo and his team kept growing the project. They involved local companies, governmental organizations, and everyday people. And by the end of 2021, they managed to deliver more than four million pounds of fruit and vegetables to families and communities in need. They calculated they had also reduced green gas emissions by close to 600 tons. Today, Redalco has become one of Uruguay’s most important NGOs.

Marcelo: Este proyecto es como un hijo para mí. La misión de Redalco es ayudar a la gente a vivir en un mundo con menos catástrofes producidas por el cambio climático. Además, todos los alimentos que se desperdician se pueden usar para acabar con el problema del hambre en el mundo, ¡y ese es nuestro objetivo! Es una enorme satisfacción para mí.

Martina: At age 29 Marcelo Sus is now one of the key figures in the nonprofit world in Uruguay. Redalco is still growing, it needs even more help. That’s why Marcelo invites you to visit redalco.org. His dream is that organizations like Redalco pop up all over the world to tackle hunger and climate change.

This story was produced by Tali Goldman, a journalist and writer based in Buenos Aires.

We would love to know what you thought of this episode! You can write us an email at podcast@duolingo.com and call and leave us a voicemail or audio message on WhatsApp, at +1-703-953-93-69. Don’t forget to say your name and where you’re from! Here’s a message we recently got from Calvin in The United States:

Calvin: Hi, my name's Calvin and I'm from the United States. The stories you put out there have really touched me. They've been really inspiring. I listen to them every day on my bike ride to work. I’m like crying now because yeah, I've definitely shown up to work with puffy eyes because the stories you put out have been so touching and so inspiring, and from the bottom of my heart, thank you very much. Keep doing the fantastic work that you're doing and looking forward to the next season.

Martina: Oh my gosh Calvin now you’re gonna make me cry. From the bottom of my heart thank you for calling in and for letting us know that we have made such an impact in your learning journey and thanks for taking us with you every day on your bike ride to work. And if the rest of you liked this story, please share it! You can find the audio and a transcript of each episode at podcast.duolingo.com. You can also follow us on Apple Podcasts or on your favorite listening app, so you never miss an episode.

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The Duolingo Spanish Podcast is produced by Duolingo and Adonde Media. I’m the executive producer, Martina Castro. ¡Gracias por escuchar!

Credits

This episode was produced by Duolingo and Adonde Media.