Sainsbury’s has announced that it will donate £3m to help the 13.7 million people in the UK struggling to afford to eat. The money will be split evenly between supporting communities with access to food now and supporting projects that help prevent people and communities falling further into food poverty in the future.
In response to the rising cost of living, the retailer has launched Nourish the Nation, a long-term programme, working with its charity partner Comic Relief, that will fund initiatives designed to tackle food insecurity and ensure communities have access to balanced, nutritional, and sustainable food sources now and in the future.
As part of the campaign, between today and 24 December, Sainsbury’s is encouraging customers to donate if they can and has pledged to match donations up to £1.5m, with this funding going to Comic Relief.
To support the Nourish the Nation programme, customers can make donations to Comic Relief in store and online at Sainsbury’s, and in store at Argos, or by donating Nectar points.
This year, through its partnership with Comic Relief, Sainsbury’s is already supporting two organisations; Feeding Britain and The Bread and Butter Thing, to help alleviate food poverty in communities that need it most.
Feeding Britain works in partnership with local food networks to develop community-based projects which support families on low incomes before they reach crisis point and need to rely on food banks. This funding from Sainsbury’s will support four food clubs in Glasgow, Gateshead, London and Nottinghamshire. Each club aims to prevent hunger, reduce food waste and ultimately lift people out of poverty through a combination of affordable fresh ingredients for families to take home, cookery sessions, and wraparound support to maximise family incomes, manage debts and budgeting, and mitigate the rising cost of living.
The Bread and Butter Thing run more than 75 mobile food clubs, delivered in partnership with local community hubs, which provide people who are struggling financially with easy access to nutritious, quality and diverse food at an affordable price. They provide wraparound support to members such as debt advice, budgeting and employability skills. The Bread and Butter Thing helps members to connect with their community, which helps to tackle loneliness, improves confidence and builds a foundation for people to move out of food insecurity. With support from Sainsbury’s, The Bread and Butter Thing will widen its impact through expanding support in the East Midlands, South Yorkshire and the North West to ensure communities in some of the most deprived locations, have access to quality and sustainable food and support services.
In addition to this, Sainsbury’s is donating a further £1.5m to key food distribution networks, with £500k going to longstanding partner FareShare through Comic Relief’s On the Breadline Winter cost-of-living Christmas appeal, which will provide funding for the equivalent of 2 million meals to those living in food poverty across the UK.
Ruth Cranston, Director of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability at Sainsbury’s, said: “With more challenging months ahead, support for those facing food poverty has never been more critical. We know how difficult the rising cost of living is for so many communities across the country which is why we’ve launched our new community programme Nourish the Nation, to help ensure that people have access to the food they need right now, whilst also helping to prevent those who are most at risk from facing food insecurity in the future.
“We are dedicated to supporting the communities we serve and through our large scale work with longstanding partners Comic Relief and FareShare, whilst supporting local projects with Feeding Britain and The Bread and Butter Thing, we hope we can go some way in providing relief to vulnerable communities up and down the country over the coming months and beyond.”
