Wheel Love: a cargo e-bike

Kayleigh Simons-Smith is the Queenstown manager for KiwiHarvest, a food rescue project that diverts otherwise wasted food to New Zealanders in need.

“There’s a Waste Minimisation Fund through our local council for community projects, and we got funding from that to purchase the e-bike with a purpose-built trailer last winter.

We launched in November. The bike is great; it’s our company vehicle. We have a pool of volunteers using it three days a week to collect and deliver food. We still do pick ups with a truck, but central Queenstown has lots of small lanes and it’s difficult to park or find free loading zones, so we thought a bike would be more suitable for café and bakery collection. And we were right! 

It’s quicker to do the rounds on the bike than in the truck. And we’ve had great response. As far as we know, it’s the first of its kind in the country – a food rescue project using an ebike.”

To volunteer, donate or find out more, see kiwiharvest.org.nz

Reported by Kathryn Webster for our Autumn 2022 issue