Foodbank Freezer Fund partnership receives royal visit

On the 22nd February, His Majesty King Charles III travelled to East London to visit The Felix Project and hear more about the progress of the foodbank freezer fund jointly launched with PWCF in December 2022.

The initiative aims to increase capacity to rescue and distribute more food by providing fridges and freezers to over 800 foodbanks and other community organisations across the UK. Additional investment in a large frozen storage facility at one of the Felix Project’s sites has enabled tonnes more food to be rescued.

The Felix Project rescues surplus food and redistributes it to over 1,000 community groups and schools across the capital. The initiative was kick started with a £1m fund, including a grant from PWCF and a personal donation from our Founder, His Majesty The King.

PWCF trustee Baroness Louise Casey, who coordinated support for the freezer fund, said:

‘Food waste is a huge challenge that urgently needs to be addressed, I was appalled to learn around 10 million tonnes of perfectly good food is wasted every year in the UK. Growing and producing food for our nation takes vast amounts of effort and resources and to throw it away, particularly during these extremely difficult times, is simply unacceptable. It is a pleasure to see the passion with which The Felix Project and partners tackle waste and climate change and get food to people who desperately need it.’

His Majesty learned more about how The Felix Project fights food poverty and food waste, as well as meeting with organisations which have received fridge / freezers, including Hackney City Farm. Rosana Bailey is the Executive Coordinator and said:

‘We received one of the donated fridges in January and it has been incredible to meet His Majesty and thank him for this transformational gift. Before we got it, there was nowhere for us to store food and it meant sometimes we had to waste items – fresh food that should be helping those in need. Now, we can store the food and give it out on another day, it has made a huge difference to our service and our community, particularly at a time when the need is so high.’

PWCF is very grateful to Waitrose & Partners for their continuing support through sales of the Duchy Organic range to support our grant making. Waitrose is also a long-term supporter of The Felix Project and a key supplier of surplus food to support their work. You can learn more about PWCF’s partnership with The Felix Project here or visit their website here.