Food waste is an issue across Canada.
Find out how our guests are working to find community solutions to the problem.
The Mustard Seed Street Church works with local retailers and grocers to r
edistribute fresh, nutritious foods through the Food Share Network (FSN).
Six days a week, our trucks pick up fresh produce and dairy products from generous grocery stores and bring them to our Food Security Distribution Centre in Esquimalt. Home to the Food Rescue Project, this 13,500 sq. foot facility operated by The Mustard Seed Street Church accepts 4,000+ pounds of “rescued food” each day. This food would have otherwise ended up in the waste stream!
The food we rescue and deliver is mostly perishable; fruits, vegetables, milk, and meat. This is all perfectly good food that has been donated because it is close to expiry, overstocked, mislabeled or has damaged packaging.
The Food Eco District (FED) is a 2 by 4 block district in the heart of downtown Victoria that is becoming the first sustainable dining district in Canada! We have 13 restaurant and café members, all focused on eco-friendly practices, and a growing number of edible gardens around town. We are also in partnership with LifeCycles Project Society to create an Urban Learning Garden in the courtyard of the downtown library where anybody will be able to learn more about growing in urban spaces.
It is our goal to create a district as distinct as China town, but all about food and sustainability, and one of the ways we do that is by hosting events that highlights food waste and what we can do to help in fun ways. From reclaimed food cooking competitions, to film screening and panel discussion, to online campaigns, we’re excited to change peoples’ relationship to their food!
Zero Waste Emporium is Vancouver Island’s first Zero Waste grocery store. We provide sustainable zero waste groceries and other items while making it easy, convenient, and affordable for customers to eliminate most (if not all) of their daily trash, and encourage them to bring their own clean and dry containers to refill. Our mission is to reduce the amount of waste that ends up in our landfill and oceans by providing bulk food, personal care, cleaning products, and sustainable reusable items - all completely package-free! Most of these items come to us through circular economy programs we have developed with our local suppliers; that way we ensure there is no packaging from the source all the way to the customers. We are fighting waste at the production side of the process as well as allowing customers to eliminate waste within their own lives.