This healthy Perth start up is giving away half of their stock to those in need

This healthy Perth start up is giving away half of their stock to those in need

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And they need your tips on who to donate to…

What happens when a medical scientist puts her mind to saving the world? Well in this case, a supplement company was born. After many evenings of discussion between Roop Judge and her husband Andrew Azevedo, Sage Plantations came to fruition, literally. They freeze dry top quality Australian fruits, vegetables and herbs in their whole form (skin and all), and place them into capsules.

A natural question comes to mind; why wouldn’t we just eat fruits vegetables? Roop knows eating produce in its whole form is better than a pill, but she saw that for lots people, consuming their daily fruit and veg count is not always realistic.

“I personally don’t get enough time to eat all the fruit and veg I need. After I had kids, I was always tired, with not enough time to eat properly,” says Roop. “You do need to eat a lot, but a lot of people don’t realise that. The research is showing there’s a big gap, because there’s rising incidents of undernourishment and obesity. Scurvy is coming back; they’ve reported a few cases of scurvy in the US.”

It’s long been said we need 2 fruit and 5 veg a day, but a more recent study at the Imperial College of London suggests 10 is much better and could prevent 7.8 million deaths worldwide. The challenge to consume the right amount of food to meet our nutritional needs is real for some of us and it’s what led Roop to create her supplements, although not all of them are made equal. When supplementing to combat tiredness and a lack of time, Roop struggled to find a brand 100% grown in Australia.

“A lot of supplements are made in Australia but the ingredients are grown and sourced from overseas, quite often from Asia and Africa. In those areas, they don’t have strict regulatory and monitoring systems in place to check if there is heavy metal contamination in their herbs, fruits and veggies. They also don’t actively monitor the water, soil and air pollution” says Roop.

After thousands of hours of medical research and an MBA under her belt, Roop began to ask what it is that makes people sick and ultimately, better or not sick at all in the first place. The answer was making nutrition more accessible, leading Roop to begin growing and testing their herbs on Andrew’s family farm — but they didn’t stop their sights there.

Trained to be broad thinkers with a scientific background, Roop and Andrew are looking to solve more than our individual needs. Aiming to scale the positive impact of their Australian made supplements globally, they’re looking for communities that lack access to good nutrition. Sending supplements like BerryCHi (filled with Kakadu plums and black cherries) to communities in need with every purchase, Sage Plantations aim to support better nutrition around the globe. It’s not just lower socio economic communities they’re helping either. Keenly aware of the farming problem in Australia, they recently supported strawberry growers after the recent strawberry tampering incident with sales from BerryChi. “Our overarching missions with this is, how do we stop the wastage of fruits and vegetables,” Roop shares. “Trillions of pounds of fruit and veg is wasted globally, and millions in Australia.”

When they’re not looking to support agriculture or communities through their business model, Sage Plantations also donate 1% of profit to the environmental organization 1% for the Planet. Believe it or not, the biggest struggle for Roop and Andrew at the moment is finding more people to help. They’ve approached organisations in rural India, Africa and Indigenous Australia, but Roop says the organisations “talked about nutritional problems in these communities, but they’d still prefer financial donations.” Currently on the hunt for some organisations that are happy to receive their generous 1:1 donation, Roop and Andrew are open to suggestions.

 

Know of an organisation or community that could benefit from their supplements? Feel free to leave any suggestions in the comments below:

Ella Liascos

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