Kwantlen Polytechnic University has partnered with Feed BC and food service provider Compass-Chartwells to bring fresh, organic produce grown by KPU faculty and students to cafeterias across all KPU campuses.
Students at KPU’s research farm, located on the Garden City Lands near KPU’s Richmond campus, will gain hands-on farming experience and play a role in the planning, planting, and harvesting required to bring produce from farm to table.
“Feed BC is a program to not only encourage buying food grown locally but to also to help those growers and producers of these local products to connect with us, create those channels and ultimately supply us with their produce,” says David Stewart, executive director of facilities services at KPU.
The Institute for Sustainable Food Systems (ISFS) at KPU is a major resource for the university’s partnership with Feed BC by being able to offer experiential learning to students on the Richmond Farm School and the Tsawwassen First Nation Farm School. ISFS also supports regional food systems by providing information and support for farmers, communities and local businesses.
Together with the ISFS, KPU students and faculty on farms and in cafeterias will be able to collaborate to create fresh and localized menus for cafeterias based on what is being produced on the farms.
“It couldn’t make any more sense for us to be serving fresh products, made by KPU students and faculty, in our cafeterias which feed our students and faculty,” adds Stewart.
KPU has committed to having thirty percent of all food in campus cafeterias sourced from local suppliers, including KPU farms, catering to a desire to see more robust local-regional food systems in the province.