Deal with RAH helps Adelaide Hills apple growers recover from devastating bushfire
It will be a long road back to recovery for Adelaide Hills fruit growers following the Cudlee Creek bushfires, but the Royal Adelaide Hospital has signed a new deal that will help.
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Adelaide Hills grower-owned cooperative Lenswood Apples has started supplying the Royal Adelaide Hospital.
The buying support has come at an opportune time with a quarter of the organisation’s growers impacted by the Cudlee Creek bushfires.
The hospital is providing 36kg of Missile apples to patients daily as part of their carefully planned menus.
Spotless executive chef Stuart McPherson, who is in charge of menus at the RAH, said the Missile variety was a perfect fit for the hospital.
“We’re keen to use local products, plus Missile is a really good nutritional, tasty apple,” he said.
The fire affected Lenswood growers include 2014 Australian Farmer of the Year Robert Green, whose family have been producing fruit in the Adelaide Hills since the 1890s.
Mr Green said for most growers it was a case of “wait and see” when assessing the devastation from the fires.
“As well as losing major infrastructure such as houses and sheds, there are some blocks that are never going to recover, but others that might,” he said.