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Improving Food Bank Gleaning Operations: An Application in New York State

Author

Listed:
  • Erkut Sönmez
  • Deishin Lee
  • Miguel I. Gómez
  • Xiaoli Fan

Abstract

Gleaning is increasingly attracting the attention of food safety networks, including food banks, as a valuable tool that simultaneously reduces food loss and alleviates food insecurity. However, managing gleaning operations can be challenging because the arrival of gleaning opportunities and the attendance of gleaner volunteers are both stochastic. We develop a stochastic optimization model to characterize and optimize a gleaning operation. The food bank chooses the gleaning schedule, which affects the gleaner capacity and the number of gleaning opportunities scheduled. In a specific field study of the Food Bank of the Southern Tier in New York, we analyze the tradeoff between call and volume service levels to find the optimum schedule that maximizes the expected total volume gleaned. Moreover, we find that increasing the gleaning window and increasing slot availability can be used as substitute mechanisms for increasing the total volume gleaned. Additionally, we use our model to assess the impact of recruiting more volunteer gleaners.

Suggested Citation

  • Erkut Sönmez & Deishin Lee & Miguel I. Gómez & Xiaoli Fan, 2016. "Improving Food Bank Gleaning Operations: An Application in New York State," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 98(2), pages 549-563.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:ajagec:v:98:y:2016:i:2:p:549-563.
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/ajae/aav069
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Vahideh Manshadi & Scott Rodilitz, 2022. "Online Policies for Efficient Volunteer Crowdsourcing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(9), pages 6572-6590, September.
    2. Akkerman, Renzo & Buisman, Marjolein & Cruijssen, Frans & de Leeuw, Sander & Haijema, Rene, 2023. "Dealing with donations: Supply chain management challenges for food banks," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 262(C).
    3. Kelsey D. Meagher & Anne Gillman & David C. Campbell & Edward S. Spang, 2020. "Relational and Logistical Dimensions of Agricultural Food Recovery: Evidence from California Growers and Recovery Organizations," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(15), pages 1-18, July.
    4. Lee, Deishin & Sönmez, Erkut & Gómez, Miguel I. & Fan, Xiaoli, 2017. "Combining two wrongs to make two rights: Mitigating food insecurity and food waste through gleaning operations," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 40-52.
    5. Byrne, Anne T. & Just, David R., 2022. "Review: Private food assistance in high income countries: A guide for practitioners, policymakers, and researchers," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    6. Gemma Berenguer & Zuo-Jun (Max) Shen, 2020. "OM Forum—Challenges and Strategies in Managing Nonprofit Operations: An Operations Management Perspective," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 22(5), pages 888-905, September.
    7. Barιş Ata & Deishin Lee & Erkut Sönmez, 2019. "Dynamic Volunteer Staffing in Multicrop Gleaning Operations," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 67(2), pages 295-314, March.
    8. Nino Adamashvili & Filomena Chiara & Mariantonietta Fiore, 2019. "Food Loss and Waste, a global responsibility?!," Economia agro-alimentare, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 21(3), pages 825-846.
    9. Nur Sunar & Jayashankar M. Swaminathan, 2022. "Socially relevant and inclusive operations management," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 31(12), pages 4379-4392, December.
    10. Suárez, Carlos Aníbal & Guaño, Walter A. & Pérez, Cinthia C. & Roa-López, Heydi, 2024. "Multi-objective optimization for perishable product dispatch in a FEFO system for a food bank single warehouse," Operations Research Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 12(C).

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