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A simple but effective plan to turn commercial food scraps into soil has been operating successfully on the Hibiscus Coast for more than a six years and is ready to grow, but to do so, it needs to collect even more food scraps from local businesses.
The project, called City to Farm, is operated by Hibiscus Coast Zero Waste. It has proved to be an innovative solution to the large amount of food scraps that are binned every day and end up in landfill, where they generate methane. Binning food scraps also wastes a resource that can help transform clay soil into a rich, friable and fertile growing medium.
Scraps are collected from a number of local businesses, pre-schools and retirement villages and taken a short distance to two farms in Wainui where they are improving soil and feeding a thriving banana plantation.
So far, more than 300 tonnes of food scraps have been diverted by the scheme.Auckland Council has recognised this effort as climate action, since topsoil building improves water infiltration, soaks in groundwater, lessens erosion and therefore buffers against extremes of drought and flooding. The project also uses biochar, which has multiple benefits to both soil building and compost production.
The introduction this year of a related project, Rural Adaptation and Resilience, aims to help rural property owners turn unproductive land into food producing land via on-farm composting and soil building involving City to Farm and the Kaipara Regenerative Farming Group.
However, to help this expansion continue, more food scraps are needed, If your business has food scraps going into the rubbish bin, City to Farm wants to take them off your hands. To find out more, email info@citytofarm.co.nz Note: The City to Farm collection is only for early childhood centres, schools and businesses.
