Rochdale Foodbank benefits from Tesco donation

Rochdale Foodbank volunteers (back) with Tesco staff Angela Gilbertson (left), community champion, and Toni Wilson (right), grocery manager

The Tesco store at Sudden, Rochdale, has donated a pallet of baked beans to the Rochdale Foodbank as the retailer is replacing all plastic-wrapped multipacks of tins.

The tins have been donated to the local foodbank, which provides three-days’ worth of goods to those in need, identified by one of over 130 agencies in Rochdale.

John Rowe, Rochdale Foodbank publicity coordinator, said: “On behalf of Rochdale Foodbank and our clients, I'd like to say a huge thank you to the staff of Tesco at Sudden for their very generous gift of large quantities of own-brand baked beans.

“We certainly support their decision to try to phase out the use of plastic-wrapped multipacks of food and we are very appreciative of the continued support we receive from Tesco in terms of donations and collections.

“Given the current anxieties regarding Coronovirus, we believe there is a real possibility that the number of clients needing our support through no fault of their own may rise steeply in the near future - and they are already at record highs.

“We need all the food we can possibly get.”

In January, Tesco announced it would eliminate 67 million pieces of plastic by replacing the wrapped products with plastic-free multibuys.

The change applies to both Tesco own-brand products and branded products. Multipacks of baked beans, tuna, tinned tomatoes and soup are among the most frequently bought grocery items in the UK, with 183,000 tinned multipacks being bought each day at Tesco stores.

In 2018, more than 6,600 three-day emergency food supplies were given to people in crisis at Rochdale Foodbank, providing more than 2,200 children with provisions.

The donation was made on Friday 6 March.