Jerusalem Food Rescue Group Launches Israel’s First Urban Food Policy Forum

by | Jun 29, 2026 | News

person feeding baby

A Jerusalem nonprofit working to keep edible food out of landfills has launched what it calls Israel’s first Urban Food Policy Forum, hoping that citywide coordination can feed more hungry residents while cutting waste. The group salvages up to 10 tons of food weekly, and it is now seeking to build a system that channels the city’s surplus produce to those who need it rather than to the trash.

Organizers say the gap is glaring. Large quantities of fresh produce that move through Jerusalem’s markets and distributors go to waste even as families across the city struggle to put food on the table. The new forum is meant to bring together municipal officials, vendors, charities, and food banks under one framework, so that rescued food can be tracked, stored, and redistributed efficiently.

The model echoes food policy councils in other major world cities, where governments treat surplus food as a resource to be managed rather than a byproduct to be discarded. Advocates argue that a coordinated approach reduces duplication among the many small charities that currently operate on their own, and that it can scale rescue operations well beyond what any single group manages today.

For Jerusalem, the stakes are both practical and moral. The city carries some of the highest poverty rates in the country, and demand at soup kitchens and distribution points has remained strong. Supporters of the forum frame the effort in terms familiar to Jewish tradition, which places a premium on feeding the hungry and on the prohibition against needless waste, known as bal tashchit.

Whether the forum can translate good intentions into a durable citywide system will depend on buy-in from the municipality and from the commercial players who handle produce at scale. For now, the launch signals a shift in thinking: treating surplus food not as garbage, but as part of the city’s safety net.

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