Getting to Know: Daniel Gladstone

Chief Food Engineer for Urban Harvest

As city infrastructures continue to grow, especially in big urban centres such as Toronto, food security has become a prevalent societal issue. “As the Chief Food Engineer for Urban Harvest, I work to bring awareness of these issues to neighbourhoods around Toronto, harvesting unwanted/overwhelming local food sources and educating people in food preservation,” Daniel Gladstone says. “We have a lot; we just need to recognize what we have got. It has been my experience that many people find their high-bearing backyard food trees to be a nuisance. Without the knowledge, equipment, or time to pick and process this food, it often rots on the ground, attracting wasps and other pests that can detract from one’s use of their limited private space,” he continues.

Although he lives in Toronto, Daniel and his small daughter found admiration in being able to pick low hanging fruit from his neighbors’ gardens, and acknowledges the bond that it brought to the community. “We developed quite a route over the years and made many local friends, happy to share their bounty with a beaming two-year-old. This interaction seemed to bring the best out in all of us: the abundance of the trees plus the thriving spirit of a toddler, who would not feel joy in sharing in such an experience? As she grew older, we would bring bags on our walks, collecting a handful of fruit from each tree to take home and preserve,” he reminisces. “We learned when the various plants would fruit and about optimal ripeness for canning and dehydrating. We learned about bugs and soil and what it means for a plant to flourish. We learned about edible native plants and wild, introduced species. This is where my passion for this project began. Now, with my child in school, I want to share this consuming interest with others. I want my neighbors to feel the same joy in their local bounty that have with mine.”

The experiences Daniel had with his daughter serve as the catalyst that pushed Urban Harvest forward — yet it didn’t start there, but rather in his mid-twenties when he volunteered with The Stop Community Food Centre and their Community Economic Development Committee. “Recognizing the food desert in Toronto’s Davenport-Perth neighborhood, the committee decided to work with Food Share to open a Good Food Market. Our mission was to bring quality, nutritious produce to the neighborhood, at as close to cost as possible. I volunteered there for a year, ordering and tracking food sales; finding foods that met the needs of the residents; and setting prices that locals could afford. We booked musicians and created a place for kids to play while their parents shopped. By the end of my time working on this project I was amazed at what a small amount of seed money can do,” he continues.

While this didn’t create any permanent solutions, Daniel carries on to say, “With a small amount of capital we created a self-sustaining, volunteer-run project, geared to suit the needs of a community. With this in mind and the experiences with my child that I have written about above, I have been inspired to start my own social enterprise to address other areas of food insecurity in Toronto.”

Realizing how far a little seed money can go thus far, Daniel and Urban Harvest also realize the potential there would be with larger investments; the opportunity to purchase and outfit an industrial kitchen, for example. “I would use this space to process produce and host educational seminars on food preservation. I would begin to develop relationships with and sponsor local community groups to promote neighbourhood food security initiatives. By fostering local food production, eventually, I would be able to repurpose this kitchen into a locally sourced, pay-what-you-can restaurant,” he says.

When the idea that harvest food not only nourishes communities, but also strengthens them physically and emotionally, Urban Harvest is set to utilize every resource possible to establish food security.

To get involved with Urban Harvest, you can visit www.urbanharvest.co or contact Daniel directly (daniel.gladstone330@gmail.com).

Story Written by Erin Ashley

Daniel is a participant in the Hook It Up program delivered by Socent7. Hook It Up is a support program for young social entrepreneurs in Ontario. Learn more at www.hookitup.ca.

*END OF PROGRAM UPDATE* Daniel has secured his first clients and collected 150kg of apples, 40kg of cherries, 45kg of grapes and 1kg of hops for jams and preserves. He is in the midst of exploring a variety of potential pricing and service models for the long-term, eg. on-the-spot mobile juicing, and various models of profit-sharing with homeowners. His top tip to other young entrepreneurs: “advertising requires simple clear statements that are unambiguous”