When Yvonne Martinez buys her weekly grocery ration from the Skyview Elementary and Middle School Pantry in Anaheim, California, her box isn’t filled with canned goods that are about to expire. Instead, it’s filled with seasonal fruits and vegetables harvested less than 25 miles away.
Not only did the selection introduce Martinez to new ingredients, like eggplant, but she also learned how to cook with them thanks to her children, who receive free schooling. “They make broccoli soup. They love cauliflower,” she says. “You don’t think kids like Brussels sprouts, and these kids love them.”
Yvonne Martinez shops at the food pantry. Photo courtesy of Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County.
The pantry is just one location in Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange CountyThe 41-year-old organization’s network of nearly 300 distribution sites serves an average of 430,000 people each month who are experiencing food insecurity.
About three years ago, the Southern California food bank added something new to its system: a 40-acre farm.
In Harvest Solutions Farm In Irvine, fresh produce is grown specifically for distribution to Second Harvest partners like the school food pantry. Since its inception in August 2021, the facility has produced more than five million pounds of nutritious food for the surrounding community.
“There is a symbolism in the fact that we are developing [locally] “We’re growing food right here and it’s going from farm to food bank to table within 48 to 72 hours,” said Second Harvest CEO Claudia Bonilla Keller. “The people who need it the most are getting some of the best food we could ever hope for.”
Volunteers work at Harvest Solution. Photo courtesy of Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County.
Most food banks operate by collecting unwanted and donated food and distributing it to food pantries and other programs so that it can be accessible to those in need. But those donations can be uncertain. Inflation and supply chain issues have made it even more difficult to sustain operations recently, especially at a level that meets the growing need.
Seventeen million households in the United States According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1.1 percent of Americans experienced food insecurity at some point in 2022, a number that has increased due to the pandemic.
Harvest Solutions Farm, operating on University of California South Coast Research and Extension Center (REC) land, growing a variety of crops year-round—from cabbage and broccoli to zucchini and watermelon—which are then harvested and transported two miles to the food bank’s warehouse, allowing the organization to quickly distribute perishable goods throughout the county.
It’s a symbiotic relationship. Second Harvest gets free access to the land (the organization pays for water and some equipment), and the soil health of UC’s unused lots is supported. Because the farm relies heavily on volunteers—an average of 170 a week—there’s also an educational component: The community gets a chance to connect with agriculture and food in a way that grocery shopping can’t provide. “People are losing their connection to agriculture,” says Darren Haver, REC system manager and interim director of the South Coast REC. “This partnership allows a lot of volunteers who have never been on a farm to actually experience it and learn about it and understand it better.”
In return, the volunteers help make the project economically viable. “The most innovative thing about it is that the product is affordable for the food bank, for us, because the work is done by volunteers, and that allows us to do [the food] at prices competitive with the state cooperative (averaging under 30 cents a pound, on par with California Food Bank Association),” Keller said. “To be honest, it’s a relatively small part of our supply chain, but we control it 100%.”
Photo courtesy of Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County.
The farm also reinforces Second Harvest’s mission of providing food access and nutritional security in a dignified way, not only ensuring that people like Martinez and her family have regular access to food, but also that food prices are truly healthy. “It’s something that not only feeds your family, but also nourishes your family,” Keller says.
While Harvest Solutions isn’t the first program of its kind (there are many other farm-to-food bank programs across the country, including Seeds of Hope in Los Angeles, South Plains Food Bank in Texas and the Golden Harvest Food Bank in Georgia), the scale of the farm is unique. And it’s something those involved think could be replicated elsewhere, especially with close collaboration.
“The model that we have across the country and virtually the world is that our expired, rejected, compromised food is given to food banks at a discount or for free and we pat ourselves on the back that we’re solving the waste problem,” said AG Kawamura, former secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture and president of the nonprofit. Solutions for Urban Agriculture. Kawamura, a farmer who has started other smaller versions of Harvest Solutions and played a key role in getting the project off the ground, said that within a season, efforts like this can “really tackle the problem of poverty head-on and make a big breakthrough right away.”
Britt and Reagan Clemens volunteer at Harvest Solutions Farm. Provided by Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County.
This is important for community members like Martinez, who has been homeless with her five children for about two years. Some of the food banks she visits will give her canned goods, which she can’t open, eat, or cook. She’ll go back to places that have fresh produce.
The family has been living in an apartment for two years, and the school pantry has been a huge benefit to her, both in terms of convenience (it’s accessible year-round) and the quality and variety of produce. Sometimes the kids head straight into the kitchen to show her their latest culinary skills. The weekly box also allows her to expand her budget to include other essentials, like proteins beyond chicken, which were previously limited to her budget. “The program has helped me in so many ways,” she says.
