Kingsway rooftop garden to benefit Edmonton Food Bank – Edmonton | 24CA News
A brand new eco-friendly initiative at Kingsway Mall is benefiting not solely the atmosphere, however the native meals financial institution as effectively.
The city rooftop backyard on the central Edmonton mall is the results of a partnership with Micro Habitat, a sustainability and concrete farming group.
The rooftop backyard is ready up with 30 pots of contemporary produce and herbs, the harvest of which is able to go fully to the meals financial institution.
The freshly planted produce — a class usually ignored when donating meals objects — will ultimately develop and develop into lots of of kilos value of contemporary meals for Edmontonians in want.
“They actually need produce, which I don’t think a lot of people realize,” stated Bo Tarasenko with Kingsway Mall. “They’re used to donating cans at the grocery store, but the food bank needs a lot of fresh produce.”
He stated the mall has at all times needed to do a rooftop backyard, but it surely wasn’t till this yr that the logistics got here collectively. Micro Habitat retains issues operating easily, tending to the vegetation and harvesting when prepared.
Kingsway Mall has been a longtime supporter of the Edmonton Food Bank, which welcomes this new undertaking.
“When people bring their stuff from the gardens, they go to our walk-in coolers and then (it) immediately gets sent out to our hamper line,” stated Tamisan Bencz-Knight, government director of the Edmonton Food Bank.
She stated the group has run its Plant, Grow, Share a Row program for over 20 years. The initiative encourages individuals to develop their very own meals, whether or not they have a planter field on their balcony or a big backyard house of their yard.
The variety of individuals counting on meals from the meals financial institution has grown considerably for the reason that begin of the pandemic. The group at present feeds greater than 35,000 individuals a month by way of its hamper program alone and buys $280,000 value of meals a month to maintain up with demand.
“That’s almost the equivalent population of Lloydminster. That’s huge volumes. Lots of people are in need,” stated Bencz-Knight.
She added that contemporary meals donated to the meals financial institution additionally goes out to neighborhood organizations just like the Mustard Seed and Boyle Street which can be serving up freshly made meals to town’s susceptible populations.
“If me, as an individual, could go out and buy my own food, I would have all the choices I want. I could buy my frozen, I could buy my fresh, I could buy my packaged. That’s what we want to provide as options for the people that we’re serving,” she stated.
This season, whether or not it’s from the rooftop or your individual backyard, each Kingsway Mall and the meals financial institution are encouraging individuals to donate any additional produce they might have from harvest.
“People growing food for us and bringing it to our warehouse will help us make sure we have that fresh food in people’s hampers, in people’s homes,” stated Bencz-Knight.
— with information from Mikaela Henschel, Global News
© 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
