Bestway Wholesale fast became the 10th biggest food donator to the Felix Project last year and has called for more businesses to also help support the “invaluable charity” as Bestway continues to provide donations throughout the Coronavirus crisis.
In February last year, Bestway began supplying surplus stock and much-needed supplies to the Felix Project which collects fresh, nutritious food that cannot be sold, and delivers this surplus food to charities and schools so they can provide healthy meals and help the vulnerable people in society.
Within a matter of weeks of working together, Bestway became the 10th biggest contributor to The Felix Project across all their sites and the 4th biggest contributor to the Felix Project’s Enfield depot. Last year these donations amounted to 4,705 crates of food, which weighed in at 55 tonnes and equated to 130,00 meals provided.
Dawood Pervez, Managing Director of Bestway Wholesale comments: “The Felix Project is an invaluable charity providing nutritious food to those in need, and we applaud what they are doing now more than ever, when so many vulnerable people are in need of food that they aren’t in a position to buy.
“It takes a lot of hard work and planning for any business to implement social distancing and new health and safety measures so as to continue a delivered operation and so to see the Felix Project team having achieved this and even expanded their operations so that smaller charities and dependent organisations including the homeless, survivors of domestic abuse and refugees can still get the food they need is highly commendable.
“In a normal week, we provide approximately three pallets of surplus stock to the Felix Project; surplus caused by damages, short dates or broken packaging and despite availability challenges of our own, we have continued to donate food throughout the Coronavirus outbreak because we see this as our ethical duty to support those in need.”
Members of the Bestway marketing team last year also supported the Felix Project by taking part in one of their nightly volunteer walks, seeing for themselves how the charity works. They comment: “We walked between cafes on a planned route as they closed, collecting surplus stock which was still in date but unable to be sold the next day and then delivered this to a local homeless shelter. The most enlightening thing to see was how most people in the shelter were asking for fresh fruit and vegetables and not just the packaged sandwiches and cakes which were most easy to get hold of.”
Whilst Bestway campaigns for more supply of stock into the wholesale and independent retail supply chain, the company has been able to deliver two pallets of much needed fruit and vegetables to the Felix Project and vital supplies of Flora, Kerrymaid and Cream in catering pack sizes. Volunteers for the Felix Project have also been vegetable-picking on farms to help provide vital fresh foods.
Mark Curtin, CEO of The Felix Project, says: “Over the past few weeks we have tripled the amount of food we send out across London to help people in need. We even set a record for us by redistributing 44 tonnes of food in one day. We still rescue surplus food from wholesalers and deliver it direct to food banks, schools, and other charities. But during this COVID-19 crisis, we are also delivering large quantities of food into new emergency food hubs, delivering to hospitals, and delivering hot meals from restaurants. Our food is also being cooked into meals and delivered direct to people’s doors, by both food hubs and local charities.
“We are doing all we can to respond to this crisis, to help the most vulnerable get food and make sure no one is left behind. But we need help to reach as many people as possible. A £30 donation will deliver 165 meals for people in desperate need.”
Pervez adds: “We need to stick together now and collaborate across businesses and charities to keep the nation fed. We will continue to support the Felix Project and similar charities where we can, because in today’s world it is not right that anyone should go hungry whilst there is food in the supply chain.”
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