OzHarvest

Context

Around the world, food waste is a real issue for sustainable development. In Australia, for example, it costs the country around $20 billion a year. The Federal Government's National Baseline Report released figures showing that Australia wastes more than 7.3 million tonnes of food every year, which equates to 298kg of food per person, making it the fourth largest per capita food waster in the world.

Meanwhile, Foodbank Australia's 2019 hunger report reveals that 21% of Australians experienced food insecurity in the year prior to the survey. The report also highlights that 30% of food insecure people go without food at least one day a week (European Red Crescent, 2020).
Moreover, from an environmental point of view, food waste contributes to the accumulation of waste, the decomposition of which is very harmful as it emits methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

In 2004, Ronni Kahn AO, a seasoned entrepreneur and campaigner, was struck by the scale of the problem, and by the fact that her own events company was responsible for food waste, and decided to set up OzHarvest.

The Project

Founded in Sydney by Ronni Kahn AO, OzHarvest is an organisation that combines the fight against food waste with the fight against food insecurity by redistributing surplus food to local charities and people in need. OzHarvest has grown rapidly to become Australia's leading organisation in the fight against food waste, hunger and food insecurity.

Described as a "food rescue organisation", OzHarvest has been working for over 16 years to make fresh food rescued from the rubbish bin accessible to the most vulnerable. Its activities have expanded to include the establishment of food and education programmes across Australia. It has a dedicated team of almost 200 staff and over 2,500 volunteers.

"We rescue food that supermarkets and food retailers can't sell because it's past its sell-by date, but is still perfectly good to eat […] If it's past its sell-by date, there's no reason to throw it away", says Ronni Kahn, founder of OzHarvest.

Implementation

OzHarvest collects good quality surplus food from registered businesses free of charge.

This food is then delivered to local charities or directly to vulnerable households who are facing difficulties such as job loss or reduced income. To achieve this, the organisation has developed a special transport system: the OzHarvest Mobile Market. These trucks travel from town to town, giving local communities free access to fresh and dry produce.

OzHarvest also aims to raise awareness of the need to tackle food waste among all stakeholders in society (businesses, government, citizens, etc.). It aims to contribute to halving food waste by 2030, in particular by working with industry and government and by providing resources (advice, downloadable posters, recipes, etc.) in different contexts (at home, at school and at work) that can be discovered on the Fight Food Waste website.

Funding

Ronni Kahn also founded ForPurposeCo, a sustainable social enterprise based on food technology and waste. It is an innovative company that seeks to bring to life new ideas that support the values and work of OzHarvest.

For example, since 2018, ForPurposeCo has been working on innovative technologies to extend the shelf life of fresh fruit and vegetables, cold chain tracking technologies or smart, sustainable packaging solutions.

The company is involved in a number of projects, including Juice For Good, which has led to the creation of the first fresh orange juice vending machine using recycled oranges.

ForPurposeCo has also become the official Australian and New Zealand partner of Winnow Solution, an artificial intelligence technology that helps hospitality companies understand the amount and type of product being wasted, as well as its economic cost, to better target interventions. According to the company, kitchens that have adopted this mechanism and tackled food waste have halved their waste in the first year of implementation.

A little extra

In March 2017, the world's first free supermarket, OzHarvest Market, opened its doors in a Sydney suburb. Its formula can be summed up as: "take what you need, give if you can". Since its inception, the store has served 132,600 customers and redistributed approximately 536,000 kg of food that would otherwise go to waste, the equivalent of 1,608,000 meals.

Ronni Kahn's journey in her fight against food waste was recently the subject of an independent film, Food Fighter, released in 2018. Ronni Kahn has also written a memoir, A Re-Purposed Life, which will be published by Murdoch Books Australia and will be available from the end of September 2020.

This leaf was written by Magda Salvatore, Let's Food intern, in June 2021.

Source: European Red Crescent, 2020. Eradicating food insecurity and hunger in Australia. [Available at: https://croissant-rouge-europeen.org/resoudre-linsecurite-alimentaire-et-la-faim-en-australie [Accessed on 28/05/2021].

Last modification : 23 Jan 2024.