Episode #37: A Talk Story w/ Aloha Harvest's Executive Director, Phil Acosta

Smart Living Hawaii

Today we will continue our Sustainable Leaders series and have a Talk Story with Phil Acosta with Aloha Harvest. We will learn about this amazing nonprofit focused on eliminating hunger by preventing food waste. How their process works, how to get involved and what their future looks like for our community in need.

Phil assumed the position as Executive Director of Aloha Harvest on September 2019 and has since modernized their fleet and doubled its staff. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting economic crisis, Phil has led the Aloha Harvest team to step up and meet the community’s growing need for food assistance, nearly tripling the volume of food that they redistribute throughout O’ahu, and quadrupling the organization’s operating budget. Prior to Aloha Harvest, Phil and his family started up their own nonprofit organization in Jan 2016, providing homeless services to under-resourced communities on the North Shore, Central and Leeward Oahu, serving as one of the founding Officers and Executive Director and he currently volunteers as the Governance Chair for the Waikiki Health Center Board of Directors.

In his previous lives, Phil managed several enterprise-level IT projects with the Hawaii State Department of Human Services and US Department of Defense. He was also as an educator for over 10 years, working with children from Pre-Kindergarten to 12th grade.

Email: [e-mail]

Website: www.alohaharvest.org

Handles: IG: @alohaharvest | FB: @alohaharvest | LinkedIn: Aloha Harvest | LinkedIn | Twitter: @alohaharvest

Address: 3599 Waialae Ave. #23 , Honolulu, HI 96816

Sites of Interest:

Bill on good Samaritan: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/1791

Washington Post on Food Waste: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2019/03/08/feature/farms-arent-tossing-perfectly-good-produce-you-are/

Food Waste Info: https://www.opala.org/solid_waste/food_waste_prevention.html and the pdf: https://www.opala.org/solid_waste/pdfs/Food_Too_Good_to_Waste.pdf

food storage chart: https://www.opala.org/solid_waste/pdfs/A_to_Z_storage_guide.pdf

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