Valentin Thurn

Valentin Thurn (born 1963, Stuttgart, Germany) is an award winning German film maker, writer and director who made the 2010 documentary Taste the Waste. He is also the co-founder of the International Federation of Environmental Journalists.

Valentin Thurn was born in 1963 in Stuttgart, Germany.

The television documentaries that he has written and directed have received awards and have been aired for numerous national German broadcasters. He is the founder of the Cologne-based Thurn Film production company which began in 2003. His film Taste the Waste which was shown at UK Green Film Festival, City Screen, York on May 19, 2012, exposed how a significant percentage of food on its journey from the farm to the dinner table ends up in landfill. He interviewed everyone in the food chain which included food producers, consumers to administrators and even politicians. It won Best Film of 2011 at Germany’s Atlantis Environment and Nature Film Festival. It also got the Documentary Film Award at EKOFILM International Film Festival in the Czech Republic. Another award in Germany that the film picked up was Environmental Media Prize by the German Environmental Organisation.

He founded the food sharing website Foodsharing.de, which was launched in January 2013. It was set up as a practical way to help to help solve food waste. The difference between this operation and food banks where people would have to prove they were needy, this one could be accessed by anybody. It was reported in November 2014 by the New York Times that in December that year, Foodsharing.de would incorporate Lebensmittelretten.de, a food sharing website which was founded by Raphael Fellmer.

He has been quoted as saying "the food industry played on consumers’ feelings to get them to buy."

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