Help to give more free fruit and vegetables

Back in July we did something radical and made all the fruit and vegetables in the Bagala Community Store in Barunga free. We can do this because we manage the store on behalf of store owners Bagala Aboriginal Corporation, and we’ve been working with them for a long time to find ways to better support the community through the store. The response was amazing and initially demand for fruit and vegetables rose by 618%, and we almost couldn’t keep up with demand!

While it’s certainly a nice gesture to make fruit and vegetables free, our motivation runs deeper. We are trying to quantify the extent to which price influences purchase and consumption of fruit and vegetables in Aboriginal communities.

Would you eat slimy lettuce?

If you look at the sales data of any community store in the NT, you’ll see dismal fruit and vegetable sales, and this is deeply concerning. We believe however that people don’t buy fruit and vegetables because they are too expensive, not because they don’t like to eat them. The prohibitive price means fruit and veggies aren’t sold quickly, and that combined with damage from freight means they look less than appetising very quickly. Would you pay top dollar for bruised apples or slimy lettuce? I think not.

Proving three things

So how does all this relate to our study? We’re trying to do three things. Firstly, we want to prove that people don’t eat fruit and vegetables because they can’t afford to. Secondly we want to highlight how easy and cheap it would be for widespread commitment to a preventative measure for Aboriginal health through the subsidisation of fruit and vegetables in all community stores. Thirdly we want to improve the quality of life for people who live in communities so they can reach their full potential by making nutritious food more attainable.