An Oceanside-based local food recovery nonprofit, ProduceGood, will be celebrating its million-pound milestone on Saturday, March 26, through its annual Spring Gleaning event at Rancho Valencia Resort & Spa.

“Because the resort has partnered with us for the last three years to recover citrus from the property to feed people, we felt that this was the perfect place to celebrate our achievement on behalf of the community we serve,” says Nita Kurmins Gilson, co-executive director of ProduceGood.

“We are often not able to use all the citrus from our trees and instead of letting it fall to the ground, Rancho Valencia partners with ProduceGood to do our part to combat food waste and food insecurity in the county,” says Simon Harris, food and beverage director at Rancho Valencia Resort & Spa. “As a luxury resort, in the heart of San Diego, it is important for us to be able to give back to the community,”

With initial food recovery activities launched by Kurmins Gilson in 2010 as CropSwap Carlsbad, she joined forces with mother/daughter team Jerilyn and Alexandra White to incorporate as ProduceGood in 2014. In eight short years, the nonprofit has become a vital part of San Diego’s food recovery system, using their decentralized model to prevent massive food waste and to empower communities to feed themselves.

“Forty percent of all food is wasted, while 1 in 3 San Diegans struggles with food insecurity, a number that has doubled since 2020,” says Alexandra White, co-executive director of ProduceGood. “We glean the excess produce and provide direct access to these nutritious fruits and veggies that would otherwise go to waste, to those who need it most.”

This small but mighty homegrown nonprofit has diverted 500 tons of perfectly edible produce from the landfill since 2010. This 1 million pounds of produce has been donated by over 600 local farmers and growers with gleaning and collection provided by thousands of volunteers to benefit over 70 feeding partners in San Diego County, all to reduce food waste and hunger while building community.

According to the San Diego Hunger Coalition, as of November 2021, more than one million people in San Diego County are facing hunger, including over 284,000 children. ProduceGood has provided over 3 million servings of fresh produce to these individuals.

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