Food poverty - managing surplus food

Description

CONTEXT

The UK has experienced a growing need for emergency food aid, a crisis of diet-related health problems and an increase in food poverty. In Coventry (population 323,000) approximately 20% of residents are living on the breadline (have no cash left after housing, fuel and food costs are spent) and a quarter (26%) of children are living in poverty. The city has a high level of inequality – 18% of people in Coventry live in areas that are in the bottom 10% for deprivation in England and 31% live in areas that are 20% most deprived areas in England.

The beneficiaries are families, children and individuals facing food poverty on a daily basis and organisations that support them. This pilot would be first tested in the area of Foleshill, the most deprived ward in Coventry, whose population experiences significantly more income deprivation, more child poverty and more old people in deprivation than average for England.

The organisations now represented by Feeding Coventry have been working and based in the community for over 100 years. Whilst food banks have played in important role in addressing an urgent need for emergency food, the objective is to find ways to address underlying causes and bring about more sustainable solutions. The pilot site Foleshill has been serving its community since 1908.

CHALLENGE

#kNOwastefood: Systematic solution 4 in real time identification of surplus food, matching with those in need, distribution and education

The UK has experienced an increase in food poverty. In Coventry 64,600 residents have no cash left after housing, fuel and food costs are spent and a quarter of children are living in poverty, facing food poverty on a daily basis. Coventry Foodbank is one of the busiest in the UK, with nearly 17,000 three-day emergency food supplies given to people in crisis per year with up to 17% increase in demand during school summer holidays. The foodbank distributes food through 16 partner churches who together with community groups fund and work towards stopping hunger in our local area.

Economic crisis, government changes to welfare system and benefit claim disruption correlate directly with the growing number of people who turn up at food banks which offer much needed albeit a short term solution. The operation is reliant on large numbers of volunteers, community groups and funding from voluntary organisations and more effective ways and sustainable solutions are needed.

Feeding Coventry is run by a broad steering committee of partners invested in addressing issues surrounding poverty, food crisis and food sustainability, including: Coventry City Council, Coventry Citizens Advice, Partnership for Coventry, Coventry University, Warwick University, Coventry foodbank, Coventry Independent Advice Services, Whitefriars Housing Association, Voluntary Action Coventry, Foleshill Baptist Church and Food Justice Network. The organisations represented by Feeding Coventry have been working and based in the community for over 100 years. The beneficiaries are families, children and individuals facing food poverty on a daily basis and organisations that support them. This pilot would be first tested in the area of Foleshill, the most deprived ward in Coventry, whose population experiences significantly more income deprivation, more child poverty and more old people in deprivation than average for England.  Whilst food banks have played in important role in addressing an urgent need for emergency food, the objective is to find ways to address underlying causes and bring about more sustainable solutions. The pilot site Foleshill has been serving its community since 1908.

Feeding Coventry aims to provide a multi-agency holistic approach to dealing with food poverty not currently in place and we are therefore looking to pilot an innovative technological approach that may bring a systematic solution to the challenge of identifying, matching and distributing surplus food, whilst educating Coventry.

THE CHALLENGE OWNER

Feeding Coventry aim to deal with food poverty/ poverty and its causes in the City of Coventry. We wish to target a number of interventions specifically designed to relieve food waste and food poverty and deal with the causes of poverty and disadvantage in Foleshill and other areas. As such this challenge complements our activities. So far the partnership has invested in community cafes, school holiday meal provision, put advice in food banks and has been involved in attracting a fuel voucher system – fuelbank – to Coventry (a partnership between the Trussell Trust and Npower). In Foleshill, we started a Food Bank Distribution Centre in Foleshill Baptist Church in November 2011. As at September 2017 we have provided food for just over 9,800 people; Tim Rees leads and co-ordinates a team of volunteers who run the Distribution Centre from the Church on Wednesdays from 12.00pm- 2.00pm. Volunteers meet and greet clients accessing the Food Bank and provide them with an emergency food parcel which provides them with a nutritional balanced diet for 3 days. As an initial step towards setting up a Pop Up Café at The Church as a Social Enterprise in September/October 2017 using surplus food from supermarkets such as Tesco, Marks and Spencer and Morrisons, the Church piloted this concept in June 2017- providing food for just over 90 people over the 4 days. We are looking to optimise the support we provide across the Feeding Coventry partnership led by Gavin Kibble.

COMMITMENT

Each of the partners within Feeding Coventry can bring its unique set of resources for implementation of the solution and the strength lies in its diversity.

CUSE as strategic node can provide pro-bono advice and links to investors.

Feeding Coventry would be the promotion and communication channel for the challenge and solutions.