Charity food scheme demand sees rent-free deal extended

AN emergency mission to feed people in Bristol during the pandemic has been extended due to “soaring” demand.

Ashton Gate Stadium has extended its rent-free agreement with FareShare South West, allowing the charity to continue using its site to store stacks of surplus food.

The FareShare base was set up in April as part of its coronavirus response, after huge numbers of people turned to food banks due to job losses and a sudden lack of income. It was a temporary measure but Ashton Gate has now agreed that the charity can stay until summer 2021, as demand for their services continues.

Mark Kelly, managing director of the sports stadium, said: “We’re delighted to continue supporting FareShare South West’s work.

“The last 12 months have demonstrated just how serious a problem food poverty is, and it’s been great to be able to help such an important charitable relief effort.”

He said he was proud of the partnership, which has enabled the charity to distribute more than 1,000 tonnes of food from its temporary food centre since the pandemic began.

To put that statistic into context, that’s about the weight of 79 double decker buses.

FareShare initially used one of the stadium’s concourses to store donated food, but moved into a warehouse on the footprint of the stadium site last summer.

In November it launched a campaign called Foodstock 2020, initially setting a target of distributing enough food for one million meals by mid February.

That target has since been increased to 2.5 million meals by the end of March, delivering to frontline organisations, including ready-to-go food parcels.