During the Covid-19 crisis, WODIN was inspired to bring a taste of home to BME women across Liverpool through our Ethnic Foodbank.
Last week, we posted a video to our social media about our Ethnic Foodbank initiative:
Started as a response to the Covid-19 crisis, ours is the first Cultural Ethnic Foodbank in Liverpool.
Social isolation did (and still does) impact our communities immensely, especially the elderly and disabled community members who are most at risk.
Women and Digital Inclusion (WODIN) wanted to do something practical to ensure our community were stocked up on healthy food staples during a period when the world was in lockdown. These foods aren’t found in the usual supermarkets like Asda, Tesco, Aldi, etc, nor can one find them in the local markets. These foods are found in specialist shops and not common to Liverpool. They also cost a lot more as they are imported from Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, and the Americas.
We decided that we could show our love to Liverpool BME communities by nourishing them with foods they know and love.
Food is a powerful source of comfort and community. Food is a source of joy. It is also medicine. Food brings people together and breaks barriers, and so we wanted to source authentic African foods to bring a taste of home to the Black immigrant communities in Merseyside.
It hasn’t been easy! We’ve had to purchase the food from Manchester Smithfield Market, an up to 70 mile round trip. We are so thankful to our volunteers who wake up at 2am to get to the market before it closes at 10am. They also trek through Merseyside to find even more produce.
The same volunteers have to drive for miles, sometimes 2 to 3 times, to deliver the ethnic food parcels to various families, elderly people, and people in isolation. These foods are staples for these BME women and their families, a powerful reminder of their cultural roots.
Our volunteers also take the opportunity to carry out welfare checks and deliver sanitising and cleaning PPE while they are out and about delivering food parcels to the vulnerable.
A huge vote of gratitude and thank you is in order to our volunteers, as well as the TNL Community Fund and FareShare UK, who enabled WODIN to deliver the Ethnic Foodbank.
If you’d like to volunteer for this project, or if you or someone you know could benefit from the Ethnic Foodbank, please click here to find out more.
