Turning waste into worth: SA Harvest’s greenhouse programme takes on food insecurity

South Africa throws away enough edible food each year to feed every hungry person in the country. The numbers are staggering: an estimated 10-million tonnes of food end up in landfills annually, while one in five South Africans goes to bed hungry.

For SA Harvest, the country’s fastest-growing food-rescue and logistics NGO, this contradiction isn’t just a moral crisis; it’s a solvable systems problem. Their latest innovation, the Greenhouse Programme, aims to prove it.

“We have enough food to feed our nation. The challenge lies in the systems of how we move, store and preserve food efficiently and equitably,” says Ozzy Nel, CEO of SA Harvest. “The Greenhouse Programme demonstrates that food waste and hunger are two sides of the same solvable problem.”

From rescued food to regenerative growth

Since its inception in 2019, SA Harvest has built a powerful national logistics network that rescues surplus food from farms, retailers and manufacturers, delivering it directly to more than 250 beneficiary organisations in South Africa. In just six years, it has rescued and redistributed more than 60-million kilograms of nutritious food, preventing an estimated 180-million kilograms of CO₂-equivalent emissions from landfill decomposition.

Now, with the Greenhouse Programme, the NGO is taking its mission one step further, from redistributing rescued food to producing new food sustainably.

Launched in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, the first phase of the programme partners with community-based organisations (CBOs) and agricultural experts to establish hydroponic greenhouses that use rescued compost and sustainable growing methods. These systems yield nutrient-rich vegetables, create jobs and reduce methane emissions from decomposing organic waste.

A new model for food security

Unlike traditional feeding schemes that rely on continuous donations, SA Harvest positions itself as a logistics and technology company with a social purpose — one that builds resilience rather than dependency.

“Our goal is to build long-term food sovereignty,” says Nel. “When communities can grow, preserve and redistribute food themselves, you break the cycle of dependency. You create systems that last.”

Each greenhouse is designed as a scalable, replicable model that can be adopted by local communities and supported by corporate sponsors and sustainability-minded investors. The initiative also reframes how donors engage with food-security projects: rather than one-off handouts, contributions are viewed as investments in national food infrastructure funding cold-chain vehicles, greenhouses and storage facilities.

Scaling up for 2026 and beyond

After successful pilots, SA Harvest plans to expand the Greenhouse Programme nationally in early 2026, with partnerships under discussion with leading FMCG retailers, logistics providers and impact investors.

For a country grappling with economic inequality and environmental degradation, the Greenhouse Programme offers a vision of circular food security where waste becomes nourishment and charity transforms into sustainability.