Our Food Sovereignty Initiatives

Free Seed Project

Since 2018, we have sent 40,000 free seed packs to people in all 50 US states! We prioritize providing seeds to people who would not otherwise be able to access seeds, first-time gardeners and people who grow food to share it with others who have low access to healthy home-grown food. Through providing seeds and educational content, we strive to increase access to organic gardening and healthy food for as many people as we can! The Free Seed Project pack includes a variety of hearty veggies, tasty herbs and healing greens to nourish the body and mind. We also include a mix of beautiful and fragrant flowers for our bee, butterfly and pollinator friends (and our enjoyment, too)! We send enough seeds to start a good-sized garden to fill each recipient’s life with health and happiness and contribute to regenerating our Earth.  That’s quite the garden, all from one envelope in the mail!

Community Fruit Trees

We have planted over 1,400 Community Fruit Trees! A community fruit tree is a publicly owned fruit tree that is easily accessible for anyone to pick from. A sign next to the tree invites people to enjoy the fruit. Each tree can be found on an online map. We plant Community Fruit Trees in many different locations where the public can access them, including residential front yards and businesses with access from a public sidewalk, in the medians between streets and sidewalks, at schools, in public parks, in the churchyard and along bike trails. These trees are planted where people walk every day and where they are highly accessible.

Although the idea of Community Fruit Trees may be simple, it is a world away from the industrial, globalized food system where most of us buy our food today. We’re on a mission to wake people up to the idea that food doesn’t have to come from the store. It can be growing all around us, in our communities, for free! Nature and community provide for each other.

Community Compost

The mission of the Community Compost Program is to strengthen community connections and give back to the planet by increasing the number of local composting programs across the country. Composting on a community scale serves a unique and important role in the sustainable food movement.  Community compost sites can be located anywhere from a backyard to a university, community garden, or local farm. By keeping the process local while engaging the community through participation and education, our community compost programs can yield many benefits, such as improving local self-reliance and food sovereignty.

We provide micro-grants to help people start Community Compost Programs in their community along with an easy-to-follow template and support from our team. Our goal is to help start 100 Community Compost Programs in 2022.

Through Gardens for the People, we have built gardens for over 40 people who dreamed of having a garden but did not have the money or means to do it on their own. We have established 11 Free Seed Libraries in publicly accessible places to freely provide seeds to the people!

Films For The People

​Since 2016, we have created over 200 videos that have been viewed over 250 million times! 

Our videos spread the messages of initiatives, organizations, everyday people and activists around the world working toward a more regenerative, equitable and just future for all. Since 2019, we have made it a central focus to feature Black, Indigenous, people of color and women-led initiatives.

People aren’t just watching the videos we produce—they are taking action! Our videos serve as accelerators for the people featured, bringing in donations, new volunteers, social media growth and media coverage.

A financial contribution to our video production does much more than just make these videos, but rather multiplies the contribution via the donations that come in to the people featured.

Our videos are creative commons and we freely share them with other media outlets to spread these important messages to the best of our abilities.

Here are two examples of what our videos can do:

Our video on David Young quickly went viral, reaching over 20 million views. Viewers donated over $10,000 to his nonprofit, local news stations came out to his farm and did stories, his inbox was flooded with people wanting to volunteer and his Facebook page grew by over 7,000% from 347 likes to over 27,000.

Debbra Arndt, the woman growing a garden to feed the elderly in her neighborhood, raised $4,500 through a fundraiser that we created for her. The local news channels covered her work and she was recognized by the Missouri House of Representatives.

​And those are just two examples of many! Learn more about our Films For The People here.
Here is a playlist including some of our recent videos:

Partnerships for Good

We believe deeply in partnering with other grassroots organizations and citizens. We redistribute a sizable proportion of our resources and funds–over $60,000 since 2015–to other organizations. Here is a list of organizations that we align with, many of which we have contributed funds or resources to.

Robin Greenfield donates 100% of his media income (from books, TV shows, etc.) to grassroots nonprofit organizations, and his financial net worth is kept to a bare minimum. In 2020, 100% of Robin’s speaking honorariums were donated to Indigenous and women-led grassroots environmental organizations. His financial vows are more than a list of resolutions; they speak to his steadfast commitment to live simply and live free. By living in this manner, he aims to show that true happiness, health and freedom do not come from an accumulation of money and possessions. Rather they come from a deep connection to our surroundings, the earth’s resources that are freely available to us all, relationships and love.

Bikes for Kids

In 2017, when Robin’s bamboo bike was stolen, we created a fundraiser and we raised enough funds to give bikes to fifty kids! We believe bad deeds cannot drive out bad deeds, only good deeds can do that! Since then we have taken multiple opportunities to provide bikes for kids.

Green Riders

In 2017, we led one of the largest grassroots bike rides across the USA in recent history. The mission of Green Riders was to do Good Deeds on Bikes and leave each community they passed through a slightly better place. On the 11-week journey, we planted 90 fruit trees and thousands of wildflower and vegetable seeds, cleaned up over 20,000 pieces of trash and rescued 5,000 pounds of good food from dumpsters. We volunteered in community gardens, cleaned up trash and performed random acts of kindness and sustainability. 48 people from seven countries around the world took part in the cross-country ride. The ride was open for anyone to join for as long as they wanted. Together the Green Riders cycled 87,000 miles. That’s 3.5 times around the world!

Trash Me

In 2016, we launched Trash Me. The average American creates 4.5 pounds of trash per day, yet most people never think twice about their trash. Once it’s in the garbage can, it’s out of sight, out of mind. We wanted to create a visual that would help people understand just how much trash they create and inspire them to make positive changes. So for 30 days, Robin lived just like the average American and he wore every piece of trash he created. Our videos were viewed tens of millions of times, the story was covered by hundreds of media outlets and our campaign created over one billion media impressions.

Dumpster Divers’ Defense Fund

In 2015, Robin publicly offered to give assistance to anyone who is arrested for dumpster diving. On October 5, 2016, nearly two years later, Tony Moyer and Sam Troyer were arrested for dumpster diving and contacted Robin. We started the Dumpster Divers’ Defense Fund and managed to have all charges against Tony and Sam dropped! The story spread nationwide through media outlets including NPR, The Washington Post and “Now This”, and this victory has set a precedent for anyone possibly arrested for dumpster diving for food in the future!

The Food Waste Fiasco

We are the creators of The Food Waste Fiasco, a campaign that strives to end food waste and hunger. We’ve hosted over 15 demonstrations across the USA.

Much of our work is brought to you through eco-adventures and environmental activism campaigns by Robin. From cycling across the country for sustainability (three times) to traveling across continents showing that people are good, to wearing 30 days’ worth of trash while living like the average American to create a visual of how much trash just one person creates, Robin has reached millions of people and gotten the wheels spinning in their heads.

Public Speaking is one of the main ways that we raise funds for our environmental campaigns. Robin has spoken at over 130 events to more than 13,000 people in 13 countries. He has spoken at a wide range of venues from elementary school through universities, small businesses to international corporations, rural villages to big cities, municipal organizations, nonprofits and more. In 2020, 100% of Robin’s speaking honorariums were donated to Indigenous and women-led grassroots environmental organizations.

Board of Directors:

                      

Robin Greenfield is a truth-seeker, activist, social reformer and servant to Earth, humanity and our plant and animal relatives. He lives simply and sustainably as a means of active resistance to oppressive, exploitative systems. His life is an experiment with truth and integrity – dedicated to liberation and basic rights for all – Earth, humans and the plants and animals we share this home with. Read his biography here.

Ryan Sandberg brings his knowledge as an entrepreneur with experience in financial and operations management for small and medium-sized enterprises. He is the CFO of a consumer reporting agency (PreSearch Background Services, Inc.) and also sits on the boards of Nature’s Closet, LLC and Gear and Country LLC. When not in the office you can find him foraging the Wisconsin forests with his best friend/daughter, Camila.

Nevada Littlewolf brings years of experience having worked across sectors of community, government, philanthropy, non-profit and business. She is the Executive Director for Our Children MN & Campaign Manager for The Page Amendment, working to create a civil right for all Minnesota children to access quality public education. Nevada served on the Virginia, MN City Council for ten years from 2008-2018. Nevada is a citizen of Leech Lake nation and has two children. She serves as Board Chair for the Women’s Foundation of Minnesota and on the boards of ClearWay MN, Minnesota Urban Debate League and Oldenburg Arts and Cultural Center. Nevada is a 2016 Bush Fellow and founded the non-profit Rural US American Indigenous Leadership and is President and owner of Seven Teachings LLC.

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400 3rd Ave W #300 Ashland, WI 54806

Our EIN is 85-4256632

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Our Commitment to Indigenous Sovereignty