By Isle of Wight Observer
Asda customers at the Newport, Isle of Wight store have donated a huge 928.68 Kgs of food to their local food bank after a week-long food drive to help tackle holiday hunger. Generous customers from the store have helped provide 2211 meals for the foodbank, to help families in need in their local community.
The week-long food drive, which took place in stores across the country in July, aimed to help meet the increased demand foodbanks face during the summer season. Anti-poverty charity the Trussell Trust reported an increase in demand for emergency food for children over the summer holidays, due to the extra financial pressure put on families who rely on free school meals during term time.
Figures released by the Trussell Trust show 87,496 food parcels went to children in the UK during the summer holidays in 2018, a 20% increase on the same period in 2017. *
Kenny Farrell, GSM, Newport Store said: “We’re always overwhelmed by the sheer volume of donations our generous customers make, not just through initiatives like this food drive, but throughout the year as they continue to donate to our permanent collection points in store.
“I want to thank our customers and colleagues for continuing to support our Fight Hunger, Create Change programme, which will make a difference in their local community, as well as on a larger scale as we continue to help people out of poverty.”
A total of 62003.89 tonnes, 147,628 meals were donated across the week-long national food drive, from stores up and down the country.
The drive is part of Asda’s Fight Hunger Create Change programme, a three-year, £20m partnership between the supermarket, anti-poverty charity the Trussell Trust and food redistribution charity FareShare.
The partnership will enable FareShare to double their capacity, meaning more food can reach those in need, while supporting the Trussell Trust to provide even more support to people referred to food banks and work towards a future without food banks, through better research into the drivers of food bank use.
