“Sharing Excess”, a group that combats food waste, organized a massive public donation in FDR Park, Philadelphia. Around 380,000 avocado units were given for free to locals and the giveaway is set to continue until Friday 21st., The Washington Post reports.

During the first months of 2022, Mexican avocado suffered a drop in production that led to higher values and an influx from other countries, such as Peru. Avocado trees are also alternate bearing and were recovering from an off year.

At that time, the price of midsize Mexican avocados peaked at $87 per case, an increase of 180% year-on-year.

However, by July and August, Mexico’s harvests increased again, which might be the reason for the surplus, analysts say. 

Presently, a case of midsize Mexican avocados now sells for $30 approximately, down about 25% from a year ago.

“We’re able to handle this amount (...) we’ve been moving these all week. It started to just get to a point where we were saturating the organizations that we normally distribute to, and we realized that we needed to probably do a large distribution on our own,” said Evan Ehlers, founder and executive director of Sharing Excess to the publication.

The non-profit organization also donated 150,000 avocados to food banks in the area. The fruit is commonly referred to as “green gold” because of its profitability.