For Immediate Release
Debris Free Oceans recognizes Fertile Earth’s work to reduce waste and recover South Florida’s surplus food for people, animals, and soil.
MIAMI, FL — August 15, 2026 — Fertile Earth has received The Pamela Barrera Zero-Waste Business Award from Debris Free Oceans, recognizing the company’s work to reduce waste and find better uses for South Florida’s leftover food.
We’re particularly happy about this one.
Fertile Earth began in 2008 with a handful of composting worms living under founder Dr. Lanette Sobel’s kitchen sink in Miami Beach. There were no collection trucks, municipal projects or grand plans for changing South Florida’s waste system. There were just some worms and the idea that food scraps shouldn’t be thrown away.
Eighteen years later, the idea is essentially the same. The operation has just gotten considerably bigger.
Today, Fertile Earth operates a growing fleet of collection trucks and has become South Florida’s largest composting and organics recovery company, serving businesses, schools, municipalities and institutions across the region.
Along the way, the mission has also expanded. Fertile Earth works to send food to its highest and best use: edible surplus food to people whenever possible, other eligible food to animals at local farms and sanctuaries, and what can no longer be eaten back to the soil through composting.
The Pamela Barrera Zero-Waste Business Award recognizes businesses working to advance a more circular, less wasteful South Florida. For Fertile Earth, it is a welcome bit of encouragement for an experiment that started under a kitchen sink and is still very much a work in progress.
“We started with worms under a kitchen sink and a stubborn belief that food scraps shouldn’t be thrown away,” said Dr. Lanette Sobel, founder and CEO of Fertile Earth. “To receive this recognition from Debris Free Oceans is a welcome bit of encouragement for work that is still very much a work in progress.”
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Fertile Earth is a South Florida composting and organics recovery company founded in 2008. The company collects and recovers food and other organic materials from businesses, schools, municipalities and institutions throughout the region, with a simple goal: put food to its highest and best use — feeding people, feeding animals and feeding the soil.
For more information, visit www.FertileEarth.net.