Food is free

Reservoir Neighbourhood House
Township/suburb:
Reservoir
Municipality:
Darebin
Notes (in their own words):

Reservoir Neighbourhood House has a ‘community pantry’, which is simply an open cupboard fixed to the outside wall to which people can either donate, or freely take out, any non-perishable food. In practice, most of the food is bought from a local supermarket using a local, grant.

It appears that most of the food is taken within a few hours of being placed there. In response, although the Neighbourhood House staff buy most of the produce on a Monday morning, they spread out the timing of its placement in the pantry. Anyone can take anything that they want whenever they want and they don’t need to interact with the Neighbourhood House staff to do so.

Monday to Thursday, the Neighbourhood House is open for emergency food relief. On Monday nights and Thursday mornings, they give away free bread. Every other Tuesday, they have a delivery of fresh produce. On the 2nd Tuesday of every month, they have a free lunch.

Reservoir share table
When:
Open 24/7
Township/suburb:
Reservoir
Municipality:
Darebin
Notes (in their own words):

This share table was started after reading about the Food is Free movement and initially comprised seedlings from CERES that were not quite good enough for them to sell at their nursery. This grew into bringing excess home and leaving them for others in the neighbourhood to rescue. More recently, a planter box has been added that others can take herbs from plus a box to share excess produce. The initiative has also fostered stronger connections between the neighbours.

Updates about availability are posted to the Reservoir Plant Exchange and Reservoir Good Karma Network Facebook groups.

Rosanna Community Pantry
When:
Open 24/7
Township/suburb:
Rosanna
Municipality:
Banyule
Notes (in their own words):

This is one of 9 community pantries around Banyule and Nillumbik. These pantries contain non-perishable food which is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week, require no appointments and are open to whoever needs food. Their philosophy is give what you can, take what you need, with people able to donate to the pantry as well.

Managed by Rosanna Fire Station Neighbourhood House on behalf of The Food Collective.