ONE FARM FOOD WASTE PROJECT | MEANINGFUL IMPACT

OneFarm Impact NPC is a purpose-built funding vehicle and impact-driven initiative that facilitates collaboration and partnership opportunities to drive transformation within South Africa’s agriculture sector.

More than 27% of South Africans live in households where poverty prevents adequate nutrition, yet 10.3 million metric tons of food are wasted every year. Commercial farmers routinely face inefficiencies as excess or sub-spec produce ties up storage and logistics capacity. Meanwhile, over two million smallholder farmers remain locked out of formal markets due to limited infrastructure, unfair pricing, limited financial inclusion, and insufficient training.

Each season, pome and stone fruit growers produce surplus, sub-spec, or non-export-grade produce that can’t enter formal retail or export channels due to cosmetic defects, market oversupply, logistics disruptions, or export rejections, a quiet but significant cost to the industry.

Operating across all nine South African provinces, OneFarm Impact’s OneFarm Share programme, powered by Standard Bank in partnership with Agri FinTech HelloChoice, takes a sector-wide view of agriculture and works to create a more inclusive and efficient agri-food value chain, connecting commercial growers, small-scale farmers, packers, market agents, and transporters in a collaborative circular giving food system that redirects perfectly nutritious produce, that would otherwise go to waste,  to food-insecure communities, simultaneously tackling food and nutrition insecurity, reducing landfill waste, lowering the industry’s environmental footprint, and opening pathways for smallholder farmers to access formal markets.

Since its inception, the programme has distributed more than 29,800 tonnes of fresh produce, providing over 118 million nutritious meals to 1.2 million people regularly. With a blended cost of just R1.30 per meal across the programme’s lifetime, OneFarm Share demonstrates that collaboration across the value chain creates multiplied impact and the deciduous fruit industry continues to play a leading role in building a more food-secure South Africa.

OneFarm Impact’s model goes beyond food rescue. Alongside commercial farmer engagement, the programme actively develops small-scale farmer market access, paying over R79 million to smallholder contributors, including R24 million to women farmers, and integrating 609 small-scale farmers into formal value chains since inception. This dual approach strengthens the broader agricultural ecosystem on which commercial producers depend.

South Africa’s food system challenges are vast, but so is the collective capacity of its agricultural sector to solve them. OneFarm Impact exists at that intersection, turning surplus into sustenance, waste into opportunity, and individual action into sector-wide transformation. The deciduous fruit industry has already proven what’s possible. Now is the time to go further, together.

How to Get Involved

Farmers, agribusinesses, packers, processors, market agents, and corporate partners can support OneFarm Impact in several meaningful ways:

• Donate surplus, sub-spec, or non-market grade produce that meets food safety standards and get a Section 18A tax-deduction on all donations. OneFarm Share handles all logistics, bins, and packaging, facilitating the collection and redistribution of donations through our CBO network
• Provide logistical support by connecting transport capacity, cold storage, warehousing, or packaging materials to extend the reach and efficiency of our distribution network.
• Contribute financially or in-kind, including funding transportation, smallholder farmer procurement, and operational costs, to help OneFarm Impact scale our impact.
• Become a CSI, ESG, or ED funder and align your corporate giving mandates with measurable, reportable food security impact.
• Partner with OneFarm Impact to champion transformation in South Africa’s agriculture sector.

To get involved or learn more, visit onefarm.africa/onefarm-impact, email connect@onefarmimpact.co.za or WhatsApp +27 61 278 9478.

Find out more about the Food Waste Project here: food waste project_one farm