The Gleaners: Collecting the fallen fruit and harvesting the left-overs for a noble cause
“When you are gathering crops in your field, you might leave some grain behind by mistake. Don’t go back to get it. Leave it for outsiders and widows. Leave it for children whose fathers have died.” — Dueteronomy 24:19
We waste somewhere around 40 percent of our food in this country, and much of that waste is left high on tree-tops and down in the fields. But a handful or organizations and individuals are banding together to collect the forgotten fennel and the fallen fruits. Here are a few stories bound to inspire:
In San Francisco, the Public Works Dept picks lemons and other fruit that would rot for the Food Bank.
Sarah Ramirez went from a Stanford PhD to a fruit picker in the Central Valley to feed the hungry through this grass-roots program.
These Urban Gleaners in Portland are redistributing food to schools in an area where 75–90% of children live below the poverty line.
Food Forward has recovered 1,889,806 pounds of food to date for hungry Los Angelinos.
Falling Fruit has collected an exhaustive list of public foraging maps and food sharing programs around the country and the globe. They recently raised $15,000 on Barnraiser to build a new mobile app to mobilize the urban harvest.
Enjoy this episode of Perennial Plate share your gleaning stories with us.
Barnraiser is the community powering the food movement one project at a time. Our mission is to put a billion dollars into the hands of food innovators as they reshape a healthy food world. From healthy and artisanal foods to community kitchens and organic farms, when we put our collective support behind these innovators, we create a healthy food future for us all.
