Wonky Box has seen 20,000kg of wonky-looking and surplus kiwifruit heading straight to customer’s doorsteps.
Wonky Box has seen 20,000kg of wonky-looking and surplus kiwifruit heading straight to customer’s doorsteps.
Opinion
THREE KEY FACTS:
Kiwifruit growers are predicting a record-breaking season.
The price of fruit and veggies dropped by around 25%, according to United Fresh New Zealand.
Wonky Box has helped divert nearly 3 million kilograms of produce from going to waste. That’s around 5.7 million kilograms of CO2-e
Angus Simms is co-founder of Wonky Box - a food rescue organisation that works with local growers to bring Kiwis ‘pear’fectly fruit and vegetables instead of going to waste.
OPINION
As little as a year ago, the state of local produce production in Aotearoa was bleak. There was a real concern for growers’ livelihoods and the impact this had on supply and demand. But now as we enter winter, we’re witnessing a recovery period for local fruit growers, and the emergence of some much-needed optimism.
Cyclone Gabrielle and the Auckland floods caused some serious roadblocks for growers, with many questioning if they’d make it through the year. Furthermore, we were heading into a warmer-than-usual winter. It’s been quite the journey for growers and business owners alike. Now that we’re heading in the right direction and crops are steadier, we can shift our focus back to reducing food waste and prioritising sustainability.
I always feel privileged to work so closely with growers. Once upon a time, we didn’t have much of a connection to growers; we’d just turn up to our local store and buy the produce we needed for the week. Now, we can hear their stories, see where our fruits and veggies are grown, and more recently, see their challenges, coupled with the way they’re being overcome.
After a rough 18 months and hearing first-hand the struggles they’ve faced, it’s a relief to see this year’s positive performance, marking a period of bounce-back for local fruit growers.
Angus Simms, co-founder of Wonky Box.
Kiwifruit growers rare predicting a record-breaking season as the industry exports its largest-ever crop. While the yield on export quality has been record-breaking and growers are netting better returns, it’s important to note there’s no such thing as a perfect harvest, there will always be fruit that doesn’t make the cut for export markets. As a result, this season we’ve seen 20,000kg of wonky-looking and surplus kiwifruit come through our doors and straight to our customer’s doorsteps.
This year’s ideal growing conditions have seen the price of fruit and veggies drop by around 25%, according to United Fresh New Zealand. Yields in citrus have been great too, with several Wonky Box partnering growers in Gisborne telling us a lot of fruit has made the cut for export this year, more than they’ve seen in a while.
This is reflected in the contents of our newly launched fruit-only box. Our customers are seeing an abundance of seasonal fruit on their doorsteps. Together with our customers, we’ve helped divert nearly 3 million kilograms of produce from going to waste. That’s around 5.7 million kilograms of CO2-e.
Imperfect shaped fruit is still perfectly edible.
Of that 3 million kilograms, Wonky Box saved 217,000kg of apples, 209,000kg of avocado and 117,000 kilograms of citrus, from going to waste.
While this news is welcomed with wide arms, we still have a real food waste problem in Aotearoa that needs addressing. It’s estimated that around 30-40% of produce grown domestically doesn’t make it off the farm. What’s more, around 100,000 tonnes of perfectly edible food is wasted annually in our country, equating to roughly $1510 per household, or $3.2 billion of wasted food for the whole country.
It’s a collective effort that we all need to be conscious of and intentional about. While Wonky Box helps our growers reduce waste on their farms, households across the country can do their bit to reduce their food waste at home. Real change starts at the individual level, which is something I implore Kiwis to embrace on their own sustainability journeys.
