Java’s Compost talks challenges and barriers of starting composting business and expanding to include residential, commercial pickup.

Good article in Waste Today by Kelly Maile on the problems of starting a compost food pick up service.  Click Here to read the article.

Many of us who have plots in Community Gardens in Southern California are aware of some of the problems.  Most of the gardens compost some of the greens that are grown, but shy away from a lot of actual food like vegetables and fruit that is bad.  This tends to go into the trash bins.

A while back we did an experiment.  We set up compost bins in several back yards.  We then collected a lot of food waste from markets and individuals in 5 gallon buckets and dropped it off at the compost locations.  The soil compost that came out was incredibly rich, and was used in growing many other veggies and tomatoes with great success.  We really didn’t have any rules, just no meat, cheese, or egg products, we took all greens, veggies that had gone bad, fruit that had started to go bad, etc.  Anyone can do this in their own back yard with good results.  We also mixed in grass and bush trimmings and other organic material from nieghbors who were trimming their landscaping.