Food waste solution: Website developed in Adelaide helps connect consumers with local produce online

A website designed in Adelaide is helping local people around the world find and share excess fruit and vegetables that would normally go to waste.

Home-grown oranges and lemons and a variety of fruits and vegetables can be sold, swapped or given away on the community market website. (Photo: 891 ABC Adelaide: Brett Williamson)

The website was designed and is operated by husband and wife team Alistair and Helena Martin.

"We saw fruit trees and citrus trees all around the suburbs just overloaded with fruit that would fall to the ground and rot," Mr Martin told 891ABC Adelaide's Drive program.

"You would see the exact same produce in the supermarket imported from interstate or overseas.

"We figured there must be a way to make [backyard] produce available to people to find and buy and create an urban market place."

The couple developed the Ripe Near Me website to help connect people with excess fruit or vegetable in their local area.

Growers can sell, trade or giveaway produce and those wanting fruit and vegetables can search for local suppliers via the site's interactive map.

Providers can set their online map status to either "growing" or "ripe" to let people know when produce is available to be collected.

Connecting produce with people around the world

People wishing to collect certain types of produce can also subscribe to a grower's status and receive an email when fruits or vegetables ripen.

Mr Martin said growers are able to communicate directly with those wanting their produce and could organise when and where goods could be collected.

"There is literally millions of dollars of produce that rots in backyards," Mr Martin said.

"You can request produce from other people in your neighbourhood within minutes.

"It just makes sense if we can make it easy for the person who is growing it to list it."

Users of the produce are encouraged to post locations of food grown on public land.

The only items restricted from listing are meats or products requiring the slaughter of livestock, any processed foods and produce grown by others.

Mr Martin said he was hoping to create a smartphone app for the website to improve its accessibility.

Ripe Near Me is free to register for and use and according to Mr Martin is the perfect way for growers to dispose of an oversupply of produce without wastage.

Growers are currently registered throughout Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the United States, with a single site also registered in Tunisia and Hawai'i.

"The more people that jump on the site, the better it gets," Mr Martin said.

Source: ABC News, Brett Williamson, 18^th August 2015
Originally published as: Food waste solution: Website developed in Adelaide helps connect consumers with local produce online