Coronavirus: Rochdale Foodbank collaborates with council to ensure those in need receive vital help

Council officers helping at Rochdale Foodbank, serving a client

During the current coronavirus pandemic, Rochdale Foodbank is collaborating with Rochdale Council to ensure that it can continue to provide emergency food parcels to local people in severe need.

Demand for food parcels has greatly increased in recent weeks, even before the onset of the pandemic, and trustees of the foodbank think it is likely that, with many people unable to carry out their normal employment and the possible future closure of schools, this demand will grow ever greater.

As a result, an emergency plan has been put in place, taking into account the safety and good health both of the Foodbank’s clients and its one hundred unpaid volunteers. The foodbank, on South Parade in the town centre, will remain open every weekday morning, but with reduced hours, from 11am until 12noon.

To minimise contact and lessen the risk of infection, clients bringing a voucher will, for the time being, not be invited to sit and have a warm drink while their food parcel is prepared, but a slightly more limited bag of food – still enough to sustain an individual, a couple or a family for at least three days – will be provided across a counter.

The foodbank will still accept donations but these should no longer be brought to South Parade but taken to the staff entrance at Number One Riverside (accessed from Smith Street by Gala Bingo) or made through the permanent collection box at the Sudden branch of Tesco.

The chair of the trustees of the foodbank, Martin Coupe said: “We greatly regret having to make these changes for the foreseeable future but we believe they will enable us to continue to serve the people of Rochdale who are suffering from food poverty.

“We are hugely grateful to the staff from Rochdale Council who are supporting us through this difficult time by receiving donations, transporting food and giving out food parcels.

“Our major concern is to keep our service going while safeguarding the health of our clients and of our volunteers, many of whom are themselves within the ‘at risk’ age group identified by the government.”

Financial donations will continue to be hugely welcome in order that purchasing of food which is in short supply can still be made.

Details of how to make such donations are available on the website at:

• www.rochdalefoodbank.org.uk