A foodbank has seen a major increase in people coming for food parcels this year.
Give A Gift foodbank in Harehills Leeds runs weekly drop in sessions where they give up to 60 food bags out per day.
The charity offers culturally appropriate food bags to their clients as many of them are immigrants or asylum seekers.
Food hub coordinator Hana Agha said, “we’re seeing an increase in referrals on a daily basis, in winter when people are putting on the heating a lot more it’s whether people heat or eat. people are struggling to buy the basic food essentials, people can’t afford to buy food and run their houses as well.
“we have a lot of volunteers who are helping us run the foodbank, the funding is there till March 2024, after that were not too sure but where doing the best that we can to support the clients.
This year, Give A Gift have introduced ‘warm spaces’. the initiative is to encourage the foodbank users to come socialize and eat in a warm space over winter.
Volunteer Shahana Hashmi is running the warm spaces scheme and said, “it’s really, really rewarding work but also it opens your eyes to see how much poverty there is out there, what the need is, and we’ve found over the years we’ve just got busier and busier.”
“people just cannot afford to buy the essentials these days, either you pay the bills or you eat. And that is a really sad state of affairs. Especially people have young children and can’t afford to feed them, or they will feed their children and then go without.”
Give a gift recently won the Kings Award for their important charity work. They are hoping to secure more funding for next year to keep the foodbank running.
