Most supermarkets have compactors.

Okay, that's true for fresh produce with a minimal shelf life. But we also do that for shelf stable (like dried, canned, jarred) foods which can much more reasonably be donated after their display date.

And that's assuming some sort of centralised donation scheme, and not just mandating the stores donate to a local foodbank or such - which would make it a bit more feasible to donate some fresh produce.

As far as "buying local", there's no reason why we shouldn't be seed-bombing food plants everywhere. Destroying the soil to grow a field of peppers for example, to mass produce and mass distribute them across the world, is not sustainable. Why should food even be "bought" local or not? How are we not lining the streets with fruit trees? Why are urban environments packed full of shrubs and bushes that aren't growing food? Why are we using lawns to just grow trimmed grass? Why aren't we utilizing natures impeccable clockwork of self-maintaining edible gardens and forests? We have all the food energy we need raining down from the sky, why aren't our rooftops being used? We could be living in an abundance of food, all local, all free. Human societies have done that for thousands of years both before and after the so-called "agricultural revolution." We know it's possible. We figured out how to turn deserts into forests by just digging a bunch of semi-circles and waiting for a bit.

But we don't because number go down instead of up. There's no money to be made in that, so even the most altruistic of investors will be deterred from the lack of monetary ROI and not the ROI of a better world. It's like the world is stuck in Dark Ages Europe, where people couldn't imagine how the world could function without the Christian god, the gospel, and the divine leadership of Kings and Queens. Now we're in a dark age where people can't imagine the world functioning without money, economic models, and the divine leadership of investors and CEOs. Thinking otherwise makes you a heretic, and considering how they used to burn thousands for the heresy of atheism much like we kill thousands for the heresy of environmentalism.

We credit the Enlightenment era for getting us out of this braindead mindset, yet little has really changed. Whether you call it capitalism or socialism, we're still draining water tables and making land uninhabitable, then turning the land into gravel and call it "development" or "productivity". The whole universe is open to this sort of insanity. We really need to go back to the ideas that inspired the Enlightenment and opened European minds to something other than their death-cult religions, like the indigenous critiques of Native Americans.

I'm an atheist to people who believe in money - I just go one God further.

Isnt eating food from dumpsters unsafe?

Idk how widespread it is but I've volunteered with organizations that get massive shipments of unsold food that's then repackaged by them and then given out or sold at a substantially lower cost, so this does happen. This is backed by federal laws limiting the liability of donors, and at least in my state there are also laws limiting food waste to incentivize participation in such programs.

Make it easy for the corpos. Criminalize destroyed food. The financial disincentive needs to be very punitive like some percentage revenue first offense. Then jail time for execs and boards. Those companies may need to hire community coordinators to deal with the near expiring foodstuffs to avoid the criminal liability. Capitalists might assume people would stop buying food and just wait for it all to be near expiring, but the reality is, those with means will take the convenience of a purchase over a long, uncertain wait, potentially queuing hours or even the night before the food banks would open. It might depress prices as they get desperate to trade some of the remaining margin before being required to give it away. Oh no, what will we do if the rich people are slightly less rich!

Actually, this is completely false for US based companies.

They limited liability in 96

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Emerson_Good_Samaritan_Act_of_1996

Do you think industrial safety standards that companies spend tonnes of money on maintaining every year just popped out of thin air or the good will of companies?

Hell no. The mega-corps at least would be chucking children into factory machines 7 days a week like back in to early 20th century if they thought they could get away with it.

If you want companies to do something they're otherwise not incentivised to do, you regulate it into existence. Force their hands just like Governments did in the past, and have now become increasingly less willing to do because of blatant corruption.

The easiest path in my mind is a one-two combo...

Firstly you give minimal liability to the food donor, so as long as they made a good faith effort to check the food wasn't bad before handing it over you can't be sued (I.e. if you're giving a batch of cans, you'd check them for defects like bloating or cracks/dents).

Secondly, you create criminal liability for throwing away non-defective shelf stable foods (such as dried, canned and/or jarred foods) for companies over a certain size (to prevent from screwing over small businesses that may not have the logistics to ensure consistent donations).

Those two things create a pathway by which donations can be made with minimal risk, and disincentivise the route of least resistance (aka. Throwing it all away).