Celebrating 100,000kg food distributed in 2018

We did it! Together in solidarity, we have all accomplished a fantastic goal. For the first time we have passed the 100,000kg mark of food distribution within a year – in 2018. This amount will continue to increase and we look forward to seeing Albanian government law changes which would increase the amount of food given to poor families in need, and as well to social soup kitchens. A BIG thank you to every volunteer, corporation, business, organization, school and to every person who helped contribute to this good cause. Together we fight poverty in Albania, step by step.

Let’s take a quick look back on 2018’s food collection and distribution, and the impact it has had on the prevention of food waste:

Most of the food was distributed though parcels of food to many NGOs across the country. About one third of the food was donated from fresh food merchants, which allowed us to save up to a whopping  96 tonnes of CO2 (carbon dioxide) from being released into the atmosphere due to the potential food wasted.1

Food collections in supermarkets provided over 30,000 meals through 15 different weekends of supermarket food drives, over 300 volunteers, and 80 separate business food collections, all totaling about 12,000kg. As well, thousands of kilograms of food was raised from farmers who are supported through one of our food production projects in the rural areas. Last year also consisted of:

Schools’ project: Education, awareness and food drives totaling almost 10 full tonnes of food raised from schools in Tirana. We are glad we are able to equip our youth with quality and updated material regarding food waste and ways to prevent it.
Special events: Red Cross project cooperation for our golf game fundraising project and a separately organized Christmas Bazaar fundraiser which together provided over 1400 meals for families in need.
Soup Kitchens & Social service distributions: Serving 10 soup kitchens in Albania
Winter project: Covering Tirana, Elbasan and Shkoder, distribution of 27,000 kg of food
NGO’s: All this could not happen without the sacrificial support of over 40 NGO’s throughout Albania. Thank you all!

     

With that said, poverty and food waste are still major issues in Albania. Almost a quarter of the population are close to or below the poverty line and may not know where their next meals for the month will come from due to financial constraints. All recipients FBA helps are in need and constantly need your help, volunteering and connections to turn this country around. Please help us overcome these obstacles and change the country one step at a time. For more information on volunteering, read and send us the volunteer application. If you are an NGO or Business, you can read about partnering with us and send an application. Contact us at info@foodbank.al for more information.

May 2019 be a year of blessing to you, and a year of plenty for the poor in Albania.

1 Total amount of fresh food collected in 2018 was about 30 tonnes. Approximately 3.2kg CO2 is produced from 1kg of food waste (4.5kg CO2/kg food waste according to https://www.energylivenews.com/2017/05/16/eu-food-waste-produces-170m-tonnes-of-co2-a-year/ and as low as 1.9kg CO2/kg food waste according to https://watchmywaste.com.au/food-waste-greenhouse-gas-calculator/)