Hungarian shoppers donated 505 million forints over the weekend

Never before has a food collection been organized in Hungary as large as the Food Bank’s campaign last weekend. From Friday to Sunday, a total of 8,800 volunteers received donations from customers in 473 units of five supermarket chains, with which they wanted to brighten the holidays of people in difficult circumstances. The shoppers who entered the stores showed exceptional solidarity: 307 kilos of donations were received every minute of the three-day campaign. This resulted in a total of 479 tons of non-perishable food being collected, enough to put together 95,811 food packages.

Two hundred thousand people contribute to a miracle

“According to our estimates, more than two hundred thousand well-intentioned people contributed some kind of food to the joint assistance. We can’t really find words for this incredible level of solidarity, but this collaboration is not about words. It’s more about the many small selfless acts that, when added together, can make the holiday season easier for hundreds of thousands of our hard-pressed compatriots. We would like to thank the donors, our volunteers, the employees of the supermarket chains that provided space for the collection, and the social professionals who will deliver these packages”

– said András Nagygyörgy, the Food Bank’s director of external relations.

Donations are distributed locally

Most donations were made in Budapest and Pest County, which is not surprising, since this is the region where the largest number of supermarkets operate. At the same time, customers also showed outstanding helpfulness in Győr-Moson-Sopron, Fejér, Veszprém and Csongrád-Csanád counties. In each of these regions, donations for more than 4,000 food packages were collected.

Every supporter can be sure that their donation helped the local people. The Food Bank, in cooperation with charitable organizations operating in the area of ​​each supermarket, delivers the collected food to those in need in the period leading up to the holidays and during the coldest weeks of January. Some of it goes to residents of children’s homes, people in elderly care, homeless and disabled people, as well as large families and single-parent households.

The most donations came from pasta and flour

Among the donations this year, pasta and flour were the most popular, with customers donating 98,000 kilograms of the former and 90,000 kilograms of the latter. Rice came in third place on the imaginary podium, but fortunately, a record amount of baby food and sweets were also received.

The dinner packages prepared in Tesco stores for the support of the charity also proved popular, with which customers could provide a full meal for a family of four in need: several thousand people contributed to the success of the collection by purchasing such packages.

The goal is to provide another four hundred thousand aid packages by the end of the year

On the occasion of the weekend campaign, Tesco also offered ten million forints in financial support for the Association’s goals. This donation is the basis for achieving an even greater mission: the Food Bank has set itself the goal of helping people in need with an additional four hundred thousand food packages in the last weeks of the year, in addition to the one hundred thousand packages collected over the weekend. They want to achieve this extraordinary undertaking by saving food, that is, by collecting products from retailers, manufacturers and catering establishments that are close to their expiration date or have defective packaging.

“Just like in the previous stages of the year, we will be distributing surplus food from hundreds of stores, manufacturers and catering establishments, as well as canteens, every day in November and December. We also welcome applications from volunteers for this work, as well as support from well-intentioned individuals and companies. Saving food is the most effective way to support people in need. A donation of one hundred thousand forints enables the collection and distribution of surplus food worth approximately three million forints”

– added András Nagygyörgy.