Local charity says cost of living crisis is making them more efficient with their spending
FareShare Surrey and Sussex have just launched their Earth Day appeal
A local charity has told us cost of living is driving charities to become more efficient than ever with the money they receive.
FareShare Surrey and Sussex has launched their Earth Day appeal where they hope to raise funds to deliver surplus food to local charities and foodbanks.
CEO Dan Slatter told us about just how important it was to make the most out of these opportunities
"We would say that it's pretty obvious in the UK that our food system is broken. And at the same time, we've got a climate crisis going on. So for us, this allows us to pull those two things together.
Moments like these are just a great opportunity to get involved"
The appeal was launched on April 22 and runs until next Wednesday (April 29). They're attempting to raise £8,000 and are matching every donation that comes in.
Dan told us why Earth Day and food waste were related.
"Globally, if food waste was a nation, it would be the third biggest emitter of greenhouse gases.
In the UK alone, millions of tons of food that are edible, 4.6 million tons of edible food is thrown away each year.
That equates to about 10 billion meals worth of food in the UK alone every year that gets thrown away, let alone all the water that's wasted in food production that gets thrown away. It's just a catastrophe in terms of its environmental impact."
Dan also spoke to us about the impact of the cost of living on the charity sector, and how it was driving them to become more efficient
"The charity sector as a whole and we're part of that as much as anyone else and feeling it as much as anyone else is struggling because there is less cash going around.
So there's this challenge, this income challenge at a time when the need is about to spike again.
We're having to really think harder all the time as a charity as to what we do with the precious resources that we have to make the maximum impact. That's kind of just an ongoing job that every charity is constantly juggling those things.
But in the last few years, we've got more food than ever coming into our warehouses.
We've nearly had a fourfold increase just in Surrey alone in the last three years of the charities that we're serving. So we're trying to ring every last drop out of every pound that comes in to our bank account."
Those who want to get involved by donating can do so by either the FareShare website or their social media pages.