Participating restaurants and businesses to begin direct support of agricultural climate solutions

Denver and Boulder County, CO — This month, Restore Colorado launches with 17 participating restaurants and businesses beginning their direct support of regional regenerative farming.

Restore Colorado is a groundbreaking public-private collaboration between Zero Foodprint*, Mad Agriculture*, Boulder County, the City of Boulder, and Denver’s Office of Climate Action, Sustainability, and Resiliency.

Under the Restore Colorado banner, Zero Foodprint member restaurants collect a few cents per meal to provide grants for carbon farming projects overseen by Mad Agriculture. This funding helps Colorado farmers and ranchers implement regenerative practices such as compost application, perennial and cover crop planting, reduced tillage, and grazing management to build healthy soil. These carbon farming projects advance regional climate initiatives around carbon sequestration, resilience, waste reduction, and circular economies.

To celebrate the launch, starting on Earth Day — April 22, 2021 — Zero Foodprint member restaurants participating in Restore Colorado will be sponsoring a compost giveaway. Customers can mention Zero Foodprint or Restore Colorado when they order or checkout to receive a coupon for a free bag of A-1 Organics Eco-Gro Compost redeemable at ACE Hardware stores. Details about the compost giveaway and a full list of current and future participating restaurants and farm projects can be found here.

“Citizens want to take climate action and now they can directly fund climate beneficial farming in their own food system, which directly benefits local communities and creates tastier and more nutritious food,” said Anthony Myint, Zero Foodprint Co-founder and Director of Partnerships. "Restore Colorado is a chance to create a new normal that tackles climate change with healthy soil on local farms. This program is all about optimism and action."

Restore Colorado creates a way for restaurants and diners to effectively and directly “vote” for climate solutions and healthy soil with each purchase. As of the launch date, 17 restaurants and businesses across Colorado have joined Zero Foodprint to support this initiative:

• A1 Organics: EcoGro Compost
• Annette (Aurora)
• Bin 707 Foodbar (Grand Junction)
• GB Culinary (Longmont)
• Nude Foods (Boulder)
• Serendipity Catering, Cafe & Coffee Bar (Denver)
• River and Woods (Boulder)
• Somebody People (Denver)
• Scraps (Denver)
• Subway (All 5 Boulder Locations)
• Sullivan Scrap Kitchen (Denver)
• Wompost (Aurora)
• Whistling Boar (Longmont)

“We are in a climate crisis, which can often make us feel helpless. Restore Colorado tackles climate change, supports our local producers, and creates healthier soils on local farms and ranches – it's a win-win," said Susie Strife, Director, Boulder County Office of Sustainability, Climate Action, & Resilience. "Boulder County is thrilled to be a part of such an innovative program”

“The impact of Restore Colorado goes well beyond the soil, it goes back to our communities,” said Phil Taylor, Executive Director and Co-founder of Mad Agriculture. “By directing resources to the foundation of our food system - the soil - we are finally able to provide reciprocity: from table to farm.”

For more information about this program visit Zero Foodprint or contact Christian Herrmann at cherrmann@bouldercounty.org.

*Background

About Restore Colorado:

Restore Colorado is public-private collaboration to improve resilience and tackle climate change through food and healthy soil on regional farms and ranches. With support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and its Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production, Boulder County is collaborating with Mad Agriculture, Zero Foodprint, and other local governments to engage with and build connections between the agricultural and restaurant communities to reduce waste and support climate beneficial agricultural practices.

About Mad Agriculture

Mad Agriculture is a Boulder-based non-profit working from head to heart, poetry to science, financing to markets, and soil to shelf to catalyze a regenerative revolution in agriculture. Mad Agriculture helps stewards of the land thrive ecologically and economically by engaging capital, markets, and a community of change.

About Zero Foodprint

Named 2020 Humanitarian of the Year by the James Beard Foundation, Zero Foodprint mobilizes the food world around climate solutions. No one can solve this crisis on their own, but tiny contributions can add up to create dramatic change. Restore Grants funded by the ZFP community have already pulled nearly 7000 metric tons of CO2e from the atmosphere — equivalent to not driving 17 million miles in the average passenger car.

Mission of the Office of Sustainability, Climate Action & Resilience

Our mission is to advance policies and programs that conserve resources, protect the environment, and safeguard our climate in order to build a sustainable, just, and resilient community.