Sharing the Surplus: AmpleHarvest.org
Are you awash in garden zucchini or tomatoes? Neighbors decline zucchini and what are you to do with it? Or at other times of the year in SoCal what do you do with the extra oranges or peaches?
Here’s your solution. Share your garden harvest with a local food pantry through AmpleHarvest.org
AmpleHarvest.org is a free, opt-in, nationwide registry that enables gardeners who’ve grown too much food to easily find food pantries in their area. They use technology to enable home and community gardeners to share their surplus harvests instead of letting them go to waste.
Here’s how it works: (From their website)
Food Pantries tell AmpleHarvest.org the days and times they want to receive fresh food.
Most food pantries find that gardeners’ produce is quickly taken by their clients — often with hours of delivery. Refrigerated storage is rarely an issue.
Gardeners find pantries on AmpleHarvest.org, and bring their surplus of locally grown, fresh food.
The best part? The food comes without packaging and isn’t trucked across the country, which is better for the environment.
People in need have healthier food options available to them.
Eating fresh lowers the risk of diet related illnesses such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and obesity.
From the AmpleHarvest.org website:
Our Vision
AmpleHarvest.org envisions an America where millions of gardeners eliminate wasted food, malnutrition and hunger in their own community.
The ultimate goal of AmpleHarvest.org:
To end food waste and hunger, reduce malnutrition and help the environment in America.
What is AmpleHarvest.org?
AmpleHarvest.org is a nationwide non-profit that uses technology to educate and enable the estimated 61 million (up from 42 million in pre-COVID19 world) Americans who grow food in home and community gardens to easily donate their surplus harvest to one of 8,159 registered local food pantries spread across all 50 states. These food pantries help nourish the one out of six Americans (including a quarter of all kids under six) that rely on these pantries.
The ultimate goal of AmpleHarvest.org:
To end food waste and hunger, reduce malnutrition and help the environment in America.
Content for this blog post is taken primarily from the AmpleHarvest.org website.
