Islanders take home potatoes by the bootful as farmers collect donations for local food banks

Islanders were able to help themselves to a bucketload — or a bootful — of free P.E.I. potatoes this weekend while also supporting a good cause. 

On Saturday, P.E.I. residents paid a visit to Island potato farmers participating in this year's "Come Fill Your Boots" in support of local food banks.

Islanders were able to top up their footwear — or their buckets, or sacks — with P.E.I. spuds at four different locations where farmers collected donations support people facing food insecurity.

The event began last year when a trade dispute with the U.S. over the discovery of potato wart on some P.E.I. fields prevented the local product from being shipped to the province's largest market.

While growers can now ship table potatoes to America, organizers say there is still plenty of need to keep this kind of event going, particularly as food prices rise.

"It's kind of a multipurpose thing to get people into the doors to see what we're doing here in P.E.I. on potatoes, and to help support the food banks because there's lots of need for that right now, too," said Randy Visser, who runs the G. Visser & Sons farm in Orwell Cove.

"Also, to just be generous and thankful for … people on the Island for being supportive of the farming industry — and we've had some challenges over the last number of months, particularly last year."

Building community

Matthew Dreise came to the Visser farm in a group of six people that hauled about 10 bags of potatoes altogether. He also participated in the event last year.

He said his family always supported the local potato industry when he was growing up, and that he's also worked at the Visser farm.

"The Island is a pretty special place," Dreise said. "We have a lot of farming communities and I think it's one of the places where everyone knows how much food is important.

"So donating not only to the farmers, [but] to the food bank is important."

Sarah Clark attended with her husband and child.

"I think [the event is] important to build our community to be able to keep it strong, support those that aren't able to have food put on their table so easily, and I think it's absolutely wonderful that the farmers of the community help so much," Clark said.

"We have yellow potatoes and I believe these are russet potatoes. And so, yeah, we're going to have some fries, I think, for dinner."

Over 5,000 Islanders visited participating farms last year, according to the P.E.I. Potato Board. They took home 160,000 pounds of potatoes, while the farmers collected about $8,500 in donations for food banks.

Visser said they'll still have to tally the numbers, but the event is really about farmers wanting to "get connected with the community."

"It's just kind of a fun thing to do and a good thing to do for the community. And that's what we're really doing it for."