The Healthy Kimberley Food Recovery Depot opened its doors four years ago!

In that time, over 305,000 pounds of food ‘fit to eat but not fit for sale’ has been diverted from the landfill – 80% deemed edible and distributed to our community, the remaining 15% to local farms.

It’s humbling to look back on the evolution of activities since the doors opened in November, 2018.

In the first year, an average of 2,580 pounds of food was recovered with 80 volunteer hours and 60 paid hours a month.

Now, each month in our food recovery and meal programs, the average is: 10,000 pounds of recovered food, 1,000 servings of lovingly prepared meals, 275 volunteer hours and 220 paid hours.

Building and nourishing relationships with volunteers, agencies, food donors, funders, and the general public is critical to our success. This community building has become a driving force in our work.

Recovered food and frozen meals are provided each week to 20 agency partners including; the food bank, family and pregnancy outreach programs, local schools, seniors programs, churches and community groups.

Over 30,000 servings of meals prepared in city-owned Centennial Commercial Kitchen as part of our Frozen Meal Program have been distributed to vulnerable community members since April 2020.
“Accessing meals through Healthy Kimberley has led to the creation of a weekly meal delivery service,” said Cathy Korven, Coordinator, Seniors Helping Seniors. “Most of our participants are elderly folks.

This program has helped us to ensure they are getting wholesome food and are checked in on regularly. It also makes everyone feel cared for and comforted to see a familiar face at their door.”

Surplus food is available at Open to Public every Friday from 12-1 p.m. and everyone is welcome. There is no charge for organizations or individuals for recovered food, although donations are gratefully accepted. During the winter holidays, additional Open to Public times are available; Tuesdays Dec. 20 and 27, 12 -1 p.m.

It’s been almost a year since relocating within the Health Centre building, bringing new life to the original cafeteria of the old Kimberley Hospital. Plans for re-creating a commercial kitchen onsite are in progress, which will increase production of meals and opportunities for food literacy programming.

Thanks to the support of the Kimberley Health Centre Society and City of Kimberley for supporting facility needs with subsidized rental rates.

Through partnerships with Kimberley Edible Garden & Greenhouse Society and Wildsight Kimberley/Cranbrook, and backyard and farm harvest recoveries, over 10,000 lbs of locally grown food was recovered this past growing season. A new initiative collected post-Halloween pumpkins which were donated to farms for animal feed and valuable compost, diverting an additional 1,000 pounds from the landfill.

To maintain the steady increase in activity and continue to meet growing needs, we are working to diversify our funding to increase sustainability so that we can be increasingly effective, responsive and targeted in supporting our community. Almost all operational costs have been covered up to this point by grants.

We’re grateful for this support and will continue to rely heavily on these funders. In addition, we are reaching out to our community for support.

Here is how you can donate to the Healthy Kimberley Food Recovery Depot or Meal Program:

We’re a registered charity and our legal name is Kimberley Wellness Foundation. We provide tax receipts and accept cash or cheque donations onsite.

Online donations are accepted through www.canadahelps.org. The link is on our website: www.healthykimberley.com.

Healthy Kimberley is currently looking for new, engaged board members, particularly to replace the outgoing treasurer, providing support for food recovery and other projects. If you’re curious to learn more about this or getting involved in other ways, we welcome visitors.

Contact Shannon at (250)427-7981 or [email protected]

Keep up to date on our activities through social media:
IG: foodrecoverydepot
FB: Healthy Kimberley page, Food Recovery Depot group

Lead image: Coordinator, Shannon, with volunteers Rhonda, Charlene and Colin. Photos courtesy Healthy Kimberley Food Recovery Depot

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