History

Lush Valley Food Action Society

An early Lush initiative was the Good Food Box (1999-2003), a monthly bulk-buying program for fresh produce, locally grown when available, organic when affordable. Next was the highly successful Fruit Tree Project (2002-ongoing), a harvest sharing partnership between fruit tree owners, volunteer pickers and local food distribution agencies such as food banks and soup kitchens. The area now harvested covers Fanny Bay to Black Creek, and the result is a cornucopia of cherries, plums, apples, pears, kiwis, figs, hazelnuts, walnuts, quince and grapes to be shared by all. Everyone benefits – tree owners by receiving a portion of the fruit collected, rather than see it wasted as windfall, and those in need who receive a bounty of fresh or preserved, nutritious local produce.

The Lush motto is: “Less about charity, more about self-reliance”.

A recent initiative, Planning for Plenty, has seen Lush Valley partner with the Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA) under the Community Food Action Initiative, a program designed to increase awareness about food security, access local healthy food and increase the community’s capacity to achieve food self-sufficiency. A sustainable food system improves the health of the community, its individuals, and the environment by enhancing our ability to feed ourselves.

Our Mission Statement and Goals

Planning for Plenty

The following two documents outline our Planning for Plenty Strageties.

Plan_for_Plenty_Report (pdf file)

Planning for Plenty II - Full Final Report (pdf file)

Harvesting and Food Recovery

We believe that it is not a lack of nutritional food that is the problem but one of distribution. We have three projects that address the problem of cost effective food distribution and reduction of food waste.
 
To support our ideals regarding food distribution we have the following projects

The Fruit Tree Project

The Fruit Tree Project in an annual harvest-sharing partnership with producers, volunteer pickers and emergency food programs. Since 2002 over 6,000 pounds per year of otherwise wasted fruit, nuts and other perishables has been distributed through the community. The program includes harvesting, pruning, canning and preservation workshops for individuals.

The area now harvested covers Fanny Bay to Black Creek, and the result is a cornucopia of cherries, plums, apples, pears, kiwis, figs, hazelnuts, walnuts, quince and grapes to be shared by all. Everyone benefits – tree owners by receiving a portion of the fruit collected, rather than see it wasted as windfall, and those in need who receive a bounty of fresh or preserved, nutritious local produce.

How you can help:

Volunteer as a picker - you will receive 1/3 of what you pick

Donate - call us to come and pick your unused fruit, vegetables or nuts and you get to keep 1/3 of the harvest

Donate—crates, ladders, buckets and bins, jars, canning supplies

Identify Harvesting Sites – if you know of trees not being harvested in your neighbourhood email or call us the contact information and we’ll call them to have volunteers help

Pick up and Deliver volunteers and harvest—gas allowance provided

All you need to do is:
Fill out our Volunteer and Membership application [link to form from VOLUNTEER page] and complete a release form and return it to us [link to form]

All you need to do is:
Fill out our Volunteer and Membership application and complete a release form and return it to us.

For more information contact: Kristina Vandor at 250-331-0152 or lushvalleyfood@yahoo.com

The Food Recovery Project:

More information is coming soon!

Buying Club for Non-profits

More information is coming soon!

Supporting Ourselves

LUSH Valley will be developing several value-added products focussing on local food, nutrition and generating revenues to support our programming.