by Andrew Jay Rosenbaum
ANKARA
The man who got a law passed to redistribute French supermarkets’ waste food to the poor and homeless has called for the system to be adopted in Turkey and around the world.
Arash Derambarsh, a 35-year-old lawyer and city councilor for Courbevoie on Paris’s northwestern outskirts, had been campaigning since January to stop supermarkets throwing away tonnes of food at the end of every day.
Last week, France’s National Assembly passed the Loi Macron finance bill that incorporated Derambarsh’s proposals.
"Now we will get the whole world to adopt the same measures," Derambarsh told Anadolu Agency in an interview late on Tuesday.
"Food is basic for everyone, everywhere. Supermarkets, all over the world, waste about 40 kilos of food [each] every day. Why not give it to the poor?
“It is something all Muslim countries, and indeed all countries, can agree on. Countries like Turkey should take advantage of Ramadan to take action."
The new French law obliges supermarkets and food stores to donate leftover food to charities. All major supermarket chains will have to sign an agreement with a charitable organization by next year.
In Derambarsh's home town, hypermarket chain Carrefour has been cooperating with his group since October and will now put the scheme into action across the country.
Derambarsh, whose family moved to Paris to escape Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution, outlined his plans for taking the scheme global.
"We will bring proposals to the G20 in Turkey in the fall and we will take it to the United Nations," he said. "This idea cuts across national and political lines - it is something everyone can agree about." U2 singer Bono’s anti-poverty group One has agreed to help Derambarsh bring his proposal to the international stage.
How it all started
Derambarsh, a politician in the Divers Droit group of right-wing councilors and lawmakers, kick-started the scheme five months ago with a petition that swiftly gained more than 200,000 signatures, including celebrities such as actress Valerie Damidot, television presenter Antoine de Caunes and actress Frederique Bel.
"The idea was simple: many people, even working, middle-class people in France, don't get enough to eat.
“When I was young and starting out, I earned 800 euros [$870] a month and paid 400 euros a month in rent. This means I had to skip meals to make ends meet. Many, many others are in the same situation and there is a growing number of people living in the street who need food."
Around eight months ago, Derambarsh set up a group in Courbevoie to obtain food and distribute it to those in need. However, they faced breaching hygiene regulations if they handed out fresh food that had not been refrigerated constantly.
His solution was to co-opt the supermarkets and Derambarsh set about convincing stores to donate the food they would normally throw away at the end of the day to his organization.
"But there was a lot of resistance from the big supermarket chains,” he told Anadolu Agency. “It had to be put into law."
After four months of campaigning, Derambarsh and his supporters convinced French lawmakers from across the political spectrum to support his plan.
Derambarsh, who says he got his sense of social justice from his film director father and cartoonist uncle, became a politician shortly after qualifying as a criminal lawyer. He was elected in 2014 and began his campaign against hunger shortly after.
"I became a politician to help people in my city,” he said. “Now, I've been hungry myself and I know what it does to a person. So it seemed like a good place to start."
