When farmers yield extra produce, where does it all go? Thanks to Farmlink Project Canada, this surfeit ends up on someone’s dinner plate instead of going to waste.
Founded by Cindy Zhang and Tom Zhao in May 2020, Farmlink Canada collaborates with local farms and neighbourhood food banks to rescue extra produce from farmers and deliver it to families in need, per the Edmonton Journal.
“Almost 2.2 million tonnes of edible food is wasted in Canada each year, while millions of Canadians are facing food insecurity,” Farmlink Canada writes in a social media post. “We focus on reducing food waste by redirecting surplus food from producers to food banks and other food service agencies.”
Food banks are welcome to collect produce from Farmlink Canada if they have their own transportation, however, the group also arranges deliveries via self-funded truck rentals. Farmlink Canada performs farm pickups on a weekly basis and is looking to expand its scale in the coming months, it told the Journal.
To date, the nonprofit has rescued about 40,000 pounds of food across Alberta and Ontario, collaborating with Edmonton’s Food Bank, Calgary Food Bank, Red Deer Food Bank, and more.
Farmlink Canada comprises 15 to 20 students working remotely in small, intimate teams across the country. While the group is volunteer-based, the organization is accepting donations to support the costs of transportation, reimbursing farmers, and daily operations.
🥪 Food waste is an “avoidable crisis”
Zhang told the Journal that the immense food waste during the COVID-19 pandemic was the impetus behind the establishment of Farmlink Canada. “We saw how millions of pounds of potatoes were getting landfilled just because of restaurant closures and we noticed that this is a problem,” she said.
“We started interviewing food banks across Alberta and we realized that the demand at food banks was increasing and a lot more people were facing food insecurity, so we wanted to connect these two together.”
Food service industries were not the only culprits of food waste during the pandemic, either.
The average Canadian household wasted about $238 in food per year since COVID-19.
Dalhousie University, Agri-Food Analytics Lab
A survey conducted by Dalhousie University’s Agri-Food Analytics Lab found that Canadian households are wasting as much as 13.5% more food since the COVID-19 outbreak. The average family generates about 5 lbs of food waste per week, which the lab has extrapolated to about 44 to 53 million pounds of food waste per month on a national scale.
“This equals an annual cost of avoidable food loss and waste in Canada, equaling $1,766 per household,” the report states. “With COVID-19, costs may have increased by $238 per household, or $2.95 billion for the entire country.”
Other nonprofits such as Second Harvest — which recovered over 22.3 million pounds of food in 2020 — and Farmwork to Feed Canada have been working to reduce food waste and educate Canadians about the importance of maximizing their pantries to get the most nutrition and worth out of grocery expenses.
Farmwork recommends five simple strategies to minimize food waste, including planning meals in advance; checking your fridge before a shopping trip; keeping tabs on expiry dates; composting food waste; and repurposing leftovers as new meals.
For those eager to learn more about food waste and rescue, Second Harvest also offers complimentary online courses with modules for businesses, schools, and homeowners alike. It also offers videos, interactive games, and free downloadable teaching resources with its courses.
“Dig into the causes of food waste in Canada; conduct a food waste audit and revolutionize your kitchen; and bust the myths about best-before dates to save money and food,” the program introduction reads.
🧑🏻🌾 Shortening the food chain
For the everyday consumer, Farmlink Canada also emphasizes the health and environmental benefits of buying local food products, especially directly from the farmer.
“Not only do locally grown food look and taste good, but they’re better for you,” according to the group. “You’re less likely to lose nutrients from food that requires less time to be transported from farm to table. By buying locally, you support your local families and businesses.”
At Truly Local Farms, we encourage growing right out of your garden, which is the most effective way to optimize food production. However, we recognize that not everyone has the luxury of time to cultivate their own food. The next best alternative is buying local because the end goal is to minimize the points of interception between the farm and your plate.
Know your farmer’s name, as we like to say at Truly Local Farms. Supporting local producers helps you understand the origin of your food, allowing you to pinpoint the individual farmer your meal came from as well as where and how your food was grown.
In purchasing food directly from producers, you shorten the food chain by eliminating the middleman. You effectively reduce the supply shrinkage and energy usage that occurs as food travels from supplier to distributor to grocer and, finally, to you the consumer.
As you can see in the above infographic, food delivery — as convenient as it is for the everyday working professional — is the most inefficient and environmentally detrimental option, where the food must go through four stages of processing and transportation before eventually reaching the consumer.
Community-supported agriculture (CSA) is another excellent initiative in which individuals pledge to financially support a farm, according to the USDA. This arrangement turns the farmland to a de-facto community farm, where the growers and consumers provide each other with mutual support, sharing the bounty of food production while also shouldering any risks of the operation.
You can locate a CSA near you with this online directory. Sustain Ontario also has a list of local food programs in the central and southern region of the province, including food share initiatives, CSAs, farmer’s markets, and healthy recipes.
Traceability of your food also brings you closer to your community and gives you the reassurance that you are feeding yourself and your family produce that is clean, healthy, and cultivated with care. Every harvest tells its own story.
Farmlink Canada is looking for like-minded volunteers to help combat food insecurity. Those interested in joining the team can apply online here.