OzHarvest Opens Kunda Park Food Rescue Hub As Sunshine Coast Demand Rises

OzHarvest has opened a new food distribution hub at Kunda Park, increasing its capacity to collect surplus produce and support charities across the Sunshine Coast and Gympie regions.

The hub is designed to rescue more food from local businesses and get it to frontline charities more quickly. OzHarvest Queensland state manager Michaela Windsor said the organisation was seeing daily evidence of hardship and food insecurity, particularly across the Sunshine Coast and Gympie regions.

The opening coincided with OzHarvest delivering its 65 millionth meal in Queensland. That figure gives the local hub a wider state context. Food rescue is not a niche charity activity. It is now part of the infrastructure that many households and community organisations rely on when grocery prices, rent and utilities leave people short.

Urban Angels, based on the Sunshine Coast, is one of the charities receiving support. Unit manager Birgit Sowden said donated food through OzHarvest made an enormous difference to the organisation's work. Urban Angels delivers up to 15,000 meals every month across the Sunshine Coast, from Gympie to Caboolture, and Sowden said the partnership helped keep costs manageable while putting more nourishing meals into the hands of people who need them.

The Kunda Park location is practical. A distribution hub needs access to food donors, delivery routes, volunteers and charities. By positioning the facility close to key food corridors, OzHarvest can reduce wasted time between pickup and delivery. That is important because rescued food is often perishable and logistics determine whether surplus becomes meals or waste.

Woolworths, OzHarvest's national food rescue partner, was also represented at the opening. Woolworths general manager social impact Adam Bray said the warehouse would significantly boost local food relief and complement the work of Queensland store teams. The partnership model is central to how food rescue operates: supermarkets, growers, wholesalers, charities, volunteers and community kitchens all have to coordinate around timing and storage.

The community need is likely to remain high. Food insecurity is often hidden on the Coast because hardship can sit behind tourism imagery, waterfront property and a strong visitor economy. Charities see a different version of the region: families skipping meals, older residents stretching fixed incomes, workers squeezed by rent, and people needing short-term help before a crisis deepens.

The new hub will not remove those causes. It will not make housing cheaper or wages higher. But it can make the relief system faster and more reliable. For local charities, that means fewer gaps in supply. For donors, it creates a clearer path for surplus food. For households under pressure, it may mean a meal arrives when it otherwise would not. That makes the Kunda Park opening one of the most practical community infrastructure stories of the week.

There is an environmental benefit as well. Food rescue keeps usable produce out of waste streams while turning it into direct social support. That combination is why the Kunda Park hub belongs in both the community and sustainability conversation. It links business surplus, charity demand and waste reduction in one local system.