Andrew at Foodbank – These Guys are amazing in feeding Australia’s Hungry behind the scenes!
Throughout my volunteer work helping the student body Enactus (Macquarie University) I was very lucky to make contact and meet with the Foodbank NSW Crowd. As part of their Marketing Issue (which they are working on), I never heard of the amazing work they are doing.
I met with one of their Managers Andrew and their operation is quite amazing. They take quality food that is about to be thrown out (i.e. say edible but damaged stock), close to use by date (but still in there), end of runs and whatever Corporate Donations they get – and help supply it to charities Australia wide. Interestingly enough, I have done lots of work with the Salvation Army and Foodbank is like their “Back-End Supplier” where they aim to get food from to give it to people that need it.
I visited Andrew, spent time in their impressive warehouse in Wetherill Park (the manufacturing / industrial hub of Sydney) and was quite impressed at how a mostly volunteer workforce is helping Australia’s Hungry. The thing that got me, was that I never realized that we had much of a hunger issue in Australia. Sure, I have been homeless a few times in my life (who hasn’t these days? x x) but I always had a meal. When I was a 10 year old and homeless, it was actually the Salvation Army that picked me up. Quite lucky I was, there was this awesome friendly group of homeless indigenous Australia’s who looked after me – and I think tipped off a local Salvation Army Solider (i.e. as a “Street Kid” I really stood out – I have an affluent Eastern Suburb Melbourne Accent that was certainly out of context).
I was only on the streets for about 3 days – and quite a bit of that time I was in parks (it was summer in Melbourne fortunately – it’s very cold in winter) and the Salvation Army was feeding me for that time. Did I pay so little attention to who gives them food? Awesome people like Foodbank. Impressive setup, check out their website – and of course if you can, love you to consider digging deep with a cash donation to those guys!
Thank you from Edward Zia!
Marketing Mentor, Temporary Homeless Kid and Persian Man who loves the gym!
No responses yet