Update (August 2024): garden volunteer shifts are still available at Baguley Farm, Clayton South! Register your interest now.
In order to cook nutritious meals at scale, FareShare needs a constant supply of quality ingredients. Our kitchen gardens help produce enough fresh vegetables to meet the growing demand for our cooked meals.
We run half-day shifts in our three kitchen gardens located in Clayton South, Abbotsford, and Moorabbin Airport.
Gardening tasks include weeding, mulching, planting, fertilizing, harvesting, composting, propagation and pest management.
Our garden volunteering is extremely popular; we currently have waitlists for all three kitchen garden sites. The shortest waitlist is at our plot on the Baguley farm in Clayton South. Our Abbotsford and Moorabbin kitchen garden waitlists are much longer.
Please register your interest to be added to your preferred kitchen garden waitlist. We will keep you updated periodically.
You can also book a corporate volunteering shift with your colleagues at our Abbotsford kitchen garden.
Our Kitchen Garden locations
Baguley Farm, Clayton South
Commercial flower, herb and vegetable grower Les Baguley has provided FareShare with the opportunity to grow vegetables at scale on his prime farm land in Melbourne’s outer fringe.
His family farm in Clayton South enables FareShare to grow a wide range of vegetables with a focus of generating yield. In 2022, the farm aims to produce 100 tonnes of vegetables for the kitchen. The top crops were cauliflower, carrot, capsicum and zucchini.
Volunteer shifts operate on Mondays – Thursday with a Saturday shift the first three Saturdays of the month. Garden shifts require a good level of physical fitness.
Please note, Baguley Farm is not well serviced by public transport.
Victoria Park, Abbotsford
FareShare has created a large kitchen garden in the heart of Melbourne on VicTrack land close to our Abbotsford kitchen.
With initial support from RACV and Gandel Philanthropy, FareShare has transformed a former dumping ground between Victoria Park railway station and Victoria Park oval, into a productive urban vegetable patch.
The kitchen garden now grows a range of vegetables on 70 beds tended by volunteers.
Due to its proximity to the FareShare kitchen, this garden is particularly valuable for growing crops with a short shelf life such as herbs. In 2020 basil, thyme, parsley, sage and oregano were grown alongside zucchini, eggplant, celery and carrots.
Volunteer shifts operate on Mondays and Wednesdays, with corporate volunteering on Fridays. There is currently a long waiting list for new regular volunteers.
Moorabbin Airport
A disused plot of land on one of Australia’s busiest airports has been donated by Moorabbin Airport Corporation and the Goodman Foundation to grow vegetables.
The kitchen garden, located next to the Australian National Aviation Museum, comprises scores of raised beds which have been planted with a range of vegetables, notably eggplant. The garden also grows root vegetables, greens and herbs.
Volunteer shifts operate on Tuesdays only.
Why volunteers love being part of FareShare
