Helping feed the world: Kindersley farmer ships lentils to BC
By Joan Janzen
joanjanzen@yahoo.com
Early Sunday morning, January 24th, Robin Walde left his family farm (Rosana Farms) and started the 17-hour journey to Abbotsford, B.C. His semi was loaded with 70,200 pounds of red lentils, which he would eventually deliver and donate to Fraser Valley Gleaners in Abbotsford. Robin explained how he found out about Fraser Valley Gleaners.
“Back in 2005, my dad donated half a load. After he passed away, I visited my uncle, who had been volunteering at Fraser Valley Gleaners for about ten years. He showed me what they did, and I was thoroughly impressed and thought it’s something I could do. It’s a huge deal for them,” Robin explained. “They get an abundance of vegetables but don’t get any protein in their soup. So they get really excited about peas or lentils to put in their soup.” Now Robin and his wife Brenda are donating their sixth load of grain to an organization that helps feed the world.
Fraser Valley Gleaners is a registered Canadian charity that’s volunteer-run and donor-driven, that’s been running for about 18 years. Its operating costs are covered by the donations of individuals, foundations and corporate sponsors. A crew of volunteers help process the food.
“They generally get 75 people showing up five days a week,” Robin said. “They have to turn people away; it’s completely amazing! Right now, they’re limited to having 30 people volunteer at a time, so the process is slower. Most of the volunteers are retired and looking for something to do. I was thrilled to see it in operation.”
Not everyone can travel the world and rescue people, but they can rescue food and make it available to people who need it. Currently, the facility makes 14.5 million meal servings a year.
They rescue, process and dry local vegetables and products that don’t meet market conditions but are perfectly good and then make them available to organizations who ship them worldwide. They begin in April with greenhouse products like tomatoes and peppers. The next season includes carrots, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, potatoes and onions. They generally get a truckload of onions from the United States and have amazing volunteers willing to peel the onions.
The vegetables spend anywhere from 8 to 10 hours in an industrial size drying unit, after which they are stored in barrels. Several winter months are devoted to transforming barrels of vegetables into a dry soup mix. Mixing lines of volunteers are set up, at which time the lentils will be added, transforming the barrels of vegetables into a tasty, add water soup mix.
During this time, volunteers also complete the bagging of dried apple snacks. After this, containers are loaded and sent off to relief and development agencies, individual missionaries and short-term outreach teams, where the soup mix is distributed to over 40 developing countries.
If anybody is interested in donating peas or lentils, they can get hold of Robin Walde at Rosana Farms, and he’ll tell you all about it.
PHOTOS:
Lentils being unloaded.
Robin Walde and his truckload of lentils.