Italian ugly food saves our winter months
The cold winter months have begun, and with them comes a shortage of Danish produce. Italy saves the day!
Frozen soil and only a few hours of daylight makes winter an unforgiving season for farmers when it comes to growing and harvesting produce in Denmark. In the months from January to March, or even April, barely anything grows on the Danish fields, and if something does grow, it is too hard and cold to harvest and get it out of the soil. This means that most Danish farmers are selling out of their fresh goods during summer and early fall, their stored goods during late fall and early winter, and slowly, but steadily run out of anything to sell during winter and early spring and the reason why even Danish farms source produce during the winter months from down South. So what does an ugly food subscription box company do, when they can’t get hands on any produce let alone the ugly specimens?
Luckily for GRIM, we were contacted in early fall by an organic Italian farm from the region of Piemonte in Northern Italy. Galia, the contact person from the farm, told us that they have mountains of surplus and second grade fruit and veg but nowhere to sell it, which is why they got excited when they found out about GRIM. Therefore: meet Bio Fruit Service that will provide us, and that means our customers too, with a little extra spice and variety in these dark and stormy winter months. They have arable fields for much longer than we do in Denmark, and so they can grow produce a long way into the Danish winter season.
In this way, the Italian farm comes to the rescue for the Danish fruit- and veg-lovers, but we also help them by paying the farmer and by giving life to all the ugly and overproduced fruit they grow. The Danish food industry comes with a lot of food waste, but so does the Italian, so of course GRIM is willing to help Bio Fruit Service fight food waste, while getting delicious fruit and veg in return.
Furthermore, at GRIM, we feel that this is a small step in the right direction — to spread the knowledge about food waste and the willingness to do something to prevent it. According to EAT Forum we can’t fix the climate issues before we fix the international food industry. And that is why one step of the way is to fight food waste globally, and not just in Denmark. Italy is that first step, and we are hoping for and looking forward to working with more farmers across Europe to help us on our mission!
If you also want to help, or know more, visit our website on eatgrim.dk.
/Article written by Simone
