Ride-sharing service Uber has just announced a national partnership with food rescue charity OzHarvest to feed the hungry & homeless.

Since 2004, OzHarvest has served the Australian community by distributing leftover perishables to those in need. Uber’s ongoing partnership will see them donating not only money and meals, but driving time as well. Uber Australia’s mission is to help OzHarvest in improving our communities by ‘…recognising and making the most of the resources we already have. Be that sharing an under-utilised private vehicle or rescuing food that would otherwise go to landfill…’.

To this end, Uber’s first goal is to donate 50,000 meals; an initial donation of $10,000 will fund 20,000 meals, and their one day launch campaign last Friday saw drivers delivering gourmet meals to uber customers across the country.

With the success of this one day initiative, Uber are now backing OzHarvest’s broader initiative – the Think.Eat.Save. Campaign. This campaign has been endorsed and backed by the United Nations, and creates awareness about global food wastage, and looks at ways we can reduce the amount of leftovers sent to landfill each year.

Global population is projected to soar by another 2 billion people by 2050, so food security and how we manage sustainable production and waste is without a doubt one the worlds next big issues.

The Uber partnership comes as Ozharvest and its Founder and CEO Ronni Kahn are celebrating 10 years of food rescue. In the last decade, Ozharvest has rescued more than 10 million kilos of food, resulting in the distribution of 35 million meals to 700 charity partners across Sydney, Adelaide, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Melbourne and Newcastle.

Ozharvest’s 10th anniversary has seen Canberra and Perth operations launch this year, so watch out for the yellow vans, and check or download the Uber app for new updates!