Central England Co-op Food Stores across Derbyshire are now part of a project that will see unsold food redirected to help hundreds of local charities.
Following the completion of a successful pilot, the retailer has teamed up with FareShare East Midlands to roll-out a project that will see all of its Food Stores across 16 counties help good causes and reduce waste in food stores.
The project will see best before food items and non-food goods that cannot be sold collected by colleagues from the Society’s Food Distribution Centre, in Leicester, then delivered to FareShare to send out to over 250 local charities across the Midlands.
All other Central England Co-op Food Stores in the area will become part of the ambitious project in the next 12 months.
Emma Woodcock, Manager at Prince Charles Avenue Food Store, said: “Everyone in our stores across Derbyshire is delighted to be part of this great project.
“Food waste is a topic customers and colleagues regularly talk to us about and it is so great that our unsold food will now be benefiting a wide variety of people connected to hundreds of local charities.”
Those involved in the project are predicting that the scheme will help cut food waste by at least 40% and provide over one million meals per year to vulnerable people.
The long-term goal is to see 100 % of best before goods that have not been sold not wasted and instead redistributed and put to use by good causes.
Hannah Gallimore, Central England Co-operative Corporate Responsibility Manager, said: “We have been looking for a solution to this issue for many years and are now proud to be rolling out our plan to tackle food waste in a manner that also has a major impact for our communities and our partners.
“We are pleased to be working with FareShare East Midlands in an effort to drive down food waste and at the same time have a major impact by helping people in need in our communities.”
One of the main reasons we are so proud of this project is the fact that it is unique and innovative.
“The process behind it is all based around ensuring that the food is sorted, collected and sent out to partners as quickly as possible to ensure that it gets to the people who need it when they need it – ranging from community kitchens to breakfast clubs and hostels.”
It also stands out because it is believed to be the first of its kind to use an existing distribution network to collect items and then deliver them to charity.
FareShare East Midlands’ Director Simone Connolly said: “We are all absolutely delighted at the opportunity to work with Central England Co-op in such a meaningful way and are so pleased that the rollout of the scheme is now underway.
“The combined effort between us will ensure that thousands more people across our region will have access to perfectly edible food that would otherwise be wasted.
“While we acknowledge that we’re not able to lift people out of poverty, we can ensure that good food isn’t wasted when there is a real need for it thanks to this ground-breaking partnership with Central England Co-op.”
