Our Fresh MEÆT micro-fundraiser was a success! 120 people came to hear pitches about seven great new food initiatives in Edmonton and vote on their favourite.

The seven pitches were all unique and diverse. They were chosen by the Edmonton Food Council from 13 applicants and each of them fulfilled some part of fresh, Edmonton’s Food and Urban Agriculture Strategy.

Each person had five minutes to pitch their idea to the crowd, and then attendees voted on their favourite.

Listening to the pitches at Fresh MEÆT. Photo c/o Mack Male.

The winner was Food4Good, a local agency providing food security services in Edmonton’s west-end. Ashley Thompson, Food4Good’s community food animator, presented their goal of building a permanent community food centre in Jasper Place. Currently, Food4Good is completely mobile – it operates all of its programming out of various spaces throughout the community. They want to expand their services in a permanent multi-purpose space, which would include a community garden, cooking workshops and a monthly collective kitchen.

Food4Good won $1700 to put towards their food hub: $1200 came from the ticket price and ATB Financial donated an additional $500.

Fresh MEÆT winner Ashley Thompson of Food4Good (centre) with Nicole Medeiros and Shariq Wani of NextGen (left), and Dustin Bajer and Kirsta Franke of the Edmonton Food Council (right). Photo c/o Mack Male.

The runner-up was Room2Grow, a vertical farming pilot project that aims to produce at least 1000 pounds of fresh produce in converted shipping containers. Raj Bali of Room2Grow won mentorship hours with the Edmonton Food Council.

Fresh MEÆT runner-up Raj Bali won mentorship hours with the Edmonton Food Council. Photo c/o Mack Male.

The Edmonton Food Council wants to help all of these great ideas succeed, so watch our site for further information about each. The other five pitches were:

• Camola Sustainable Bakery: traditional Italian snacks made with the addition of insect flours.
• Grocery Bus: alleviating food deserts by providing a bus that picks up people living in areas with lower/no access to healthy, inexpensive food, takes them to an affordable grocery store and returns them back home with their groceries.
• Our Servings: a technology platform that diverts wasted food from the landfill, making it easier for donors to give and for agencies to accept.
• Sea to Sky Aquaponics: educating children about aquaponics and the role it plays in sustainable food production, with the long-term goal of having aquaponics incorporated into school curriculums.
• Selam Meat Shop business plan: develop a sustainable business plan for a halal meat shop providing affordable, healthy halal meat to the Muslim community.

Prior to the pitches, attendees noshed on some delicious food from local Edmonton food producers: pretzels from Zwick’s Pretzels, assorted finger foods from Equi-tea and doughnuts from Doughnut Party.

The Edmonton Food Council would like to thank everyone who helped make Fresh MEÆT a success! Special thanks to Edmonton NextGen for helping to organize and host the event, and ATB Financial for letting us use their Entrepreneur Centre as well as making a donation to the prize pot.

Also thanks to Metro Edmonton, which ran a couple stories on Fresh MEÆT. You can read those here and here.