A total of 25,760 meals have been provided to people in need this Christmas thanks to customer donations at Tesco stores across Somerset, including in Burnham-On-Sea.
Supermarket shoppers were asked to donate long-life items to help people in need as part of their usual shop, with Tesco topping up the value of the customer donations by 20% for charities FareShare and The Trussell Trust, which oversee local Foodbanks.
In Somerset, a total of 25,760 meals were donated by generous customers at Tesco stores including the following:
Weston: 6,477
Burnham-On-Sea: 4,271
Taunton: 3,942
Shepton Mallet: 3,055
Yeovil: 1,840
Wells: 1,675
Clevedon: 1,445
Langport: 1,314
Chard: 887
Ilminster: 854
The two food charities, FareShare and The Trussell Trust, see an increase in the need for donations at this time of year.
The food donated to local Foodbanks in The Trussell Trust’s network – which includes Burnham-On-Sea and Highbridge – is given in emergency food parcels to people referred because they cannot afford to feed themselves and their families.
Food donated to FareShare is distributed to charities and community groups who use it to provide meals for vulnerable groups such as isolated older people and those in homeless shelters.
The 20% top–up donation provided by Tesco helps the charities in their work, by providing funding to run the foodbanks and distribute the food to those in need.
Samantha Stapley, Operations Manager at The Trussell Trust said: “Our Foodbank network has spent the last month making sure that people referred to them with no money for food don’t go hungry this Christmas. This work has been made possible thanks to the incredible generosity of Tesco customers, store colleagues and volunteers during the Food Collection. Thank you for your support – your generosity has stopped hunger this Christmas.”
Thanks to customers’ generosity and the Tesco top-up this year’s collection has seen over 3 million meals worth of food donated to help people in need. It brings the overall total donated by Tesco shoppers since the Food Collection scheme began in 2012 to more than 49m meals.
