Robin Greenfield has a disarming smile, the fruit of an incurable optimism, fuel to the fire of an environmental and social battle that he started at a very young age and has never given up. Born on August 28, 1986 in the United States, Robin is classified in Internet literature as "an environmental activist and humanitarian, known for undertaking extreme projects to draw attention to issues such as food waste, consumerism, and above all environmental and social sustainability”.
Contrary to many fake environmentalists, and to the large population of the caste of "green consumers" Robin puts his body, his face and even his wallet at the service of his cause, so much so that he has become known to all as "the Robin Hood of modern times". His life is a mix of useful provocations under the banner of (true) sustainability and a simple and genuine generosity: he walks the streets of New York wearing clothes made only from garbage, he travels with a bamboo bicycle, and donates a significant portion of its earnings to strictly women-led non-profit organizations.
Rob has toured the United States, from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast, by bicycle, stopping in small and large towns in search of wasted food, rummaging through the dumpsters at the entrances of supermarkets and large-scale retail outlets, pulling out perfectly edible food. Once the food that ended up in the trash was recovered, Greenfield went to public parks in the cities he visited, opening bags, sacks, and packages, and began a veritable leftover cooking show, preparing 21 recipes with the ingredients rescued from the trash. The cooked food was distributed to those who requested it.
Greenfield's main objective, in all its actions, is first and foremost to stimulate awareness and consciousness on environmental issues. Through his site and its profiles socialBy setting an example for readers to follow, Rob encourages others to do the same, to take action, to become a sort of "guardian of food waste." More generally, Rob's invitation is to mobilize against a lifestyle that is no longer sustainable.
From 2018 to 2019, for a year, Roby lived in a small tiny house Installed on the property of a woman who allowed him to cultivate her land to produce his own food. For 365 days, without any basic technical skills, Rob neither purchased food from the food chain nor consumed ingredients that were not self-produced. He encouraged everyone to do the same, transforming gardens and meadows into vegetable gardens and orchards, asking neighbors for land to cultivate and then sharing the fruits of his cultivation with them. The challenge was to demonstrate that nature can be a food store, a pharmacy, and can meet any need: in the various gardens has grown more than 100 different types of foodVegetables, greens, and fruit: all produced without a gram of fertilizers or pesticides. This too is a symbolic and provocative gesture, if you like, but at least it's useful in drawing people's attention to the need to gently but energetically change their lifestyles, always raising and extending our gaze to others, those less fortunate than ourselves. Because this perspective is also part of the vocabulary of (true) sustainability.
Featured image and accompanying text taken from Rob Greenfield's Facebook page and the website www.robingreenfield.org
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