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Lahaina Plantation Days will be a zero waste event

By Staff | Oct 8, 2015

Morrison

LAHAINA – It’s a spoon! It’s a fork! It’s a bamboo, re-usable, sustainable “spork,” and everyone receives one free with each paid admission at Lahaina Plantation Days. We are implementing zero waste at this year’s event to be held on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 16 and 17, from 5 to 10:30 p.m. at the Old Pioneer Mill Co. Smokestack. Parking is free.

Instead of dumpsters loaded with food waste, plastic utensils and plates going to the landfill after the fun is over, Simplifresh Farms will make compost from the biodegradable event waste. The pigs at L.B. Farms will get a special treat with buckets of vegetable trimmings and other tasty goodies from the restaurant food booths. Sodas will be served in colorful, collectible cups that may be taken home or left in specially marked bins at the event. Simplifresh Farms will also utilize the used cooking oil as natural pest control.

In addition to the popular food contest awards, a special Eco Award will be announced each night for the restaurant food booth with the most environmentally friendly food, dcor and serving plates.

Lahaina Plantation Days will work in collaboration with the Maui Huilau Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes environmental literacy and leadership among Maui’s youth, by supporting their #Sporkitup initiative. Recently, Maui Huliau launched their #Sporkitup Instagram Challenge, which will take place Oct. 12-16 in high schools island-wide. More information about the challenge is available at www.mauihuliaufoundation.org/sporkitup/.

During the Plantation Era, food was grown in home gardens with surplus canned and preserved. Rice and flour sacks were made into colorful curtains, and food scraps were fed to the backyard chickens. Waste as we know it today did not exist. Recycle and re-use were a way of life.

Lahaina Plantation Days was created to honor the generations of plantation workers and their families. At this year’s event, we are taking that to the next level with our commitment to zero waste and our embrace of the Plantation Era adage “Waste not. Want not.”

Event admission is $5. Children five and younger are free. For more information, contact the Lahaina Restoration Foundation office at (808) 661-3262, e-mail info@lahainarestoration.org or visit www.lahainarestoration.org.