Volunteering for people and planet

Recently we took some time to volunteer with one of our community partners, KiwiHarvest - a charitable organisation that collects good food from around Auckland before it goes to waste and gets it to those in need.

Based at KiwiHarvest’s main depot in East Tamaki, we packed ‘waste’ produce delivered from suppliers including wholesale producers, supermarkets, delis and meal bags. This ‘waste’ produce is perfectly fresh and edible, but may be considered not quite perfect for sale or be excess to needs. The produce arrived in large crates, which we unloaded and packed into cardboard boxes, ready to be sent out to the many charitable organisations KiwiHarvest services.

There were tomatoes, bok choy, slaw, mesculin, herbs, chillis, cucumbers and more. In total, we packed 3,795kg of produce, enough to create 10,842 meals (literally, enough to feed an army!)

This builds on our previous volunteer experience with KiwiHarvest, where we helped collect the food from suppliers to be delivered direct to recipients, including churches, charities and not-for-profits.

KiwiHarvest is one of the partners we support within Ko tatou te taiao, our community investment programme. Each of our partners was carefully selected for the dual benefit they provide for people and environment.  Food waste is estimated to contribute 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions, so through their efforts, KiwiHarvest is not only helping to feed those in need, but also reducing food waste as an emissions source.

KiwiHarvest estimates our volunteer efforts saved 10 Tonnes of CO2e. To put this in perspective, as a company we’ve emitted around 12T of CO2e operating over five years. So it’s awesome to think we could clean up 10T in the space of 3 hours!

We’re committed to continuing our investment in KiwiHarvest’s journey and next time we’ll be looking to use our experience as sustainability consultants to provide some skills based volunteering to support KiwiHarvest’s strategic planning and partnership engagement. Watch this space!