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It's estimated that more than 40 million pounds of fresh produce are wasted every year, and in an effort to reduce that amount, the Great Falls Community Food Bank is teaming up with two national campaigns.

The food bank recently announced that they will be working with Ample Harvest and Plant-A-Row For The Hungry.

The two organizations will help bring awareness to Montanans about how to donate their food instead of throw it away. Gayle Gifford, director of the Great Falls agency, says that any extra produce that gardeners have will help.

She noted, "It's too much food and they can't handle it. They've already left enough tomatoes and zucchinis with their neighbors and then they're looking for someplace else to put it, and we can certainly take the extra produce, we're more than happy to take it."

Click here to visit the food bank website. Below is more information about the partner organizations:

AmpleHarvest.org is an effort to enable food pantries and banks to be easily located by local backyard gardeners wishing to share their excess bounty with neighbors in need. The National Gardening Association estimates more than 40 million pounds of produce is discarded by millions of backyard gardeners because their plants produced far more than they could possibly use, preserve or give away. The Great Falls Community Food Bank is listed as one of the local agencies that can accept fresh produce from backyard and community gardens.

Plant-A-Row for the Hungry is a people-helping-people program to help feed the hungry in local neighborhoods and communities. Launched in 1995 by the Garden Writers Association, Plant-A-Row encourages gardeners to grow a little extra and donate the produce to local food pantries and banks. The Great Falls Community Food Bank implemented the program this Spring inviting gardeners to commit to donating some of their produce at harvest in exchange for seeds and compost in the Fall.