Foodbank reaches out a hand across islands

On an island where everyone knows everything about everyone else, it can be daunting for families to reach out for help.

Shetland Foodbank understands those challenges and is working hard to support people and families all over the island, from Unst to Sumburgh.

As a result of the pandemic the Lerwickbased team began delivering food parcels which have played a huge part in helping people overcome what’s known as the “Shetland Pride”.

A team made up from members of the council, a local nursery, foodbank volunteers and people doing community service came together to help.

Neil Beattie, who coordinates the deliveries sent to the island from foodbank charity Cfine, said: “We call it Shetland Pride, people are a bit too proud to come and ask for help.

“We’ve certainly helped families who would never go to a foodbank, but they were in trouble and in need, hopefully we’ve been able to help them.

“For a while we were delivering to schools, we do still deliver to some schools, but on the whole we deliver to houses, so there’s not really any stigma attached to it, it’s all very discreet.”

In his role, Mr Beattie

co-ordinates deliveries sent to the island from Cfine, which distributes supplies for FareShare.

The charity works across Grampian, the Highlands and islands, supplying donations to foodbanks and clubs and groups who support those who need them.

Mr Beattie said the team knew they had to rethink how they were working when donations in the

foodbank started piling up during lockdown. “The foodbank in Shetland is well looked after, people donate quite a lot so we ended up having quite a lot of stuff,” he said.

“A lot of the stuff we were getting were things people were donating, anyway – pasta, tins of beans, soups and things like that.

“I was talking to one of the women who runs a nursery and said ‘have you

got any families who need help because I’ve got loads of stuff’. She thought it would be a very good idea so we started a kind of food larder from there.”

The Press and Journal, Evening Express and Original 106 have teamed up for The Big Christmas Appeal, which aims to shine the light on food poverty while raising funds and gathering donations for Cfine.

Once the Shetland team started delivering food parcels to local families, their good deed spread by word of mouth and more people came forward for support.

Mr Beattie said, at its peak, the team was delivering to nearly 100 families across the island every two weeks.

He said: “We had about six or seven families and we were giving them bags of shopping every week and then it kind of grew from there.

“We’ve been delivering food parcels out to families who are struggling for the past year and a bit, and that was all done independently of the actual foodbank.

“I think in the end we ended up supporting something like 85 families, I think it was around 150 children.”

He explained that they used the food deliveries as a “gateway in” to see if families needed any more support, like help with heating bills or claiming benefits.

Haulage company Northwards takes Cfine donations up on the boat to Shetland for free, and NorthLink doesn’t charge it to do so.

Though the foodbank is kept going by donations from islanders, the extra deliveries over lockdown were strongly supported by Cfine, who Mr Beattie described as “very helpful and obliging”.

This had a big impact on those in need in the community.

Mr Beattie said: “We’ve had people in emergency circumstances and we’ve been able to help them on the same day.

“People are very grateful for the help they get.”

The Shetland Foodbank is also open three times a week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoons.

TAKING STOCK: Foodbank volunteer David Grieve looks over the donations ready to be distributed across Shetland.