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It’s Not AlwaysLow-Hanging Fruit
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S U P E R I O R P R O P E R T Y . A B S T R A C T D E V E L O P M E N T S
DEBORAH WICKINS
apples and plums with rats and raccoons.
property bore more than she couldhandle: her lone apple tree produced225 kilograms per year, more than three
BY STEVE CAREY PHOTO BY GARY MCKINSTRY
Creative consultation courtesy of The Market on Yates
Fruit Tree Project coordinatorRenate Nasher-Ringer saysmore people want to grow,eat and buy local produce.
C
USTOM
D
ESIGNS
FOR
U
NIQUE
L
IVING
S
PACES
ALL THAT GOLD . . .
. . . And Green too!
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“After my first summer living in this house, watching allof the fruit going to rot, I just couldn’t keep up. I thought,‘what a waste’,” says Wickins, who teaches business coursesat the University of Victoria and Royal Roads University.“We have this abundance of healthy, nutritious, amazingproduce that previous generations decided to make happenby planting these trees, and to have it go to waste would besuch a shame.”Then Wickins read about the Fruit Tree Project, a pick-and-redistribute program operated by the LifeCycles ProjectSociety. She registered her treesimmediately.Since 2000, LifeCycles, a localnon-profit that promotes healthy communities, urban agriculture andfood security, has organized volunteersto pick the trees of registered treeowners like Wickins in exchange for adonation. The fruit is distributed toowners and volunteers at the time of the pick, while the rest of the grocery-quality fruit goes to local food banksand community organizations. Theproject keeps some fruit to makeproducts to be sold through localbusinesses.Every year, the project redistributesthe equivalent of more than 85refrigerators full of fruit, or roughly 13,500 kilos. But relying on grant-funding and donations means theprogram is always in danger of disappearing. So far, thepartnership with local businesses does not bring in enoughrevenue to cover costs. As for Wickins, she has scheduled a pick every summersince 2004. She says working with the project was easy andthe volunteers were wonderful.“This is an important service for the local Victoriacommunity,” says Wickins, who increased her donation last year when she heard the project’s funding had been cut.The growing season and weather in Victoria net aplethora of plums, pears, cherries, figs, quince, grapes andapples. That’s thousands of kilograms of fruit to be picked July through September. Last year, volunteers picked 19,530kilos of fruit, the largest pick to date.“Initially it started to stop food going to waste, withpeople asking ‘how can we use this food?’ ” says RenateNasher-Ringer, a nurse and the project coordinator. “Now with the common theme of eating local, growing localand consuming local goods, more people are buying intothe idea.”
“Now with thecommon themeof eating local,growing localand consuminglocal goods,more peopleare buying intothe idea.”
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