Vidula Aiyer organizes Rotary Club of Cupertino volunteers to pick surplus backyard fruit and deliver it to West Valley Community Services. The team of roughly 10 volunteers has harvested over 850 pounds since last spring, collecting lemons, oranges and plums. Volunteers harvest for a few hours about once a month from trees in Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara and Campbell. The collected fruit serves up to roughly 700 households in the West Valley and can be redirected to other meal providers when abundant. Fruit beginning to rot is sent to local farms for compost rather than the landfill.
Aiyer, who leads the Rotary Club of Cupertino's fruit harvesting pilot program in collaboration with hunger and homelessness nonprofit West Valley Community Services, has harvested more than 850 pounds of fresh fruit since the idea came to life last spring. Her team of roughly 10 volunteers has picked fruit three times from residents who offer their trees to the program, including lemons, oranges and plums.
The fruit, which comes from trees in Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara and Campbell, serves up to roughly 700 households throughout the West Valley. Aiyer wants more tree donors to sign up so the program isn't limited to harvesting about two trees per session. "This is my ambition... There should be no food falling on the ground at all," she told San José Spotlight. "We ought to be aware that we have a place to do something better with it."
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