Velma The Veggie Van: Transporting Good Food Across Ottawa

Velma the Veggie Van is the beloved mascot of the Ottawa Community Food Partnership (OCFP). She was purchased thanks to a grant from One Environment, and officially hit the streets in December of 2020.

Velma helps to create positive change in our communities through her work with OCFP.  Excess produce and food products in retail stores accounts for 12% of avoidable food loss and waste - that’s 1.31M tonnes or $5.70B worth of food. (Nikkel et al., 2019, p.15) Driven by some of our amazingGood Food Chauffeurs,  Velma helps to facilitate food rescue and good food distributions in the city of Ottawa. Partnering with local grocery stores and businesses, Velma and her team use various methods, such as the Second Harvest Food Rescue App, to rescue excess foods from all around the city. These donations are used by various agencies, and even our very own Cooking with a Cause program in order to address the increased rates of hunger stemming from the pandemic by helping to fill a food insecurity gap.

When it comes to food-insecurity in Ontario, an approximate 13.3% of households indicated some level of food insecurity prior to the pandemic, and these rates have only increased. (Tarasuk & Mitchell, 2020, p.3) Velma has helped Cooking for a Cause Ottawa to share over 170,311 meals in 2021 , including 8383 litres of soup & 15,058 loaves of bread & bagels, to our hungry Neighbours and community members. 

Velma, Cooking for a Cause Ottawa, and OCFP work together to nourish our community, and shift the way we think about the food charity model in Ottawa. They help to educate the public, advocate for and with their Neighbours, and foster relationships between local businesses and food insecure communities. 

Article written by: Stefanie Mitchell, BECD student at Algonquin College