B&Q Cheetham Hill

The Food Rescue Group at Manchester mobilises an active and committed network of student volunteers and community partners from across the city. Led by students from local universities, the group turns climate concern into practical action by addressing food waste at a grassroots level. Food waste is a major driver of climate change. Valuable resources such as land, water, and energy are consumed to produce food, yet large quantities are discarded and sent to landfill, where they generate methane, a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide. By rescuing surplus food and redirecting it to people who need it, the group reduces environmental harm while supporting families and individuals across Manchester. The initiative works in partnership with local producers, retailers, and food businesses to ensure surplus food is used rather than wasted. These partnerships reduce disposal costs for businesses while delivering measurable environmental benefits. In Manchester, operations are powered by students from the University of Manchester, Manchester Metropolitan University, the University of Salford, the University of Bolton, and the Royal Northern College of Music, alongside members of the Hindu community and other local groups. Together, they demonstrate how student-led action can create meaningful climate impact. Pickup and distribution in Manchester are coordinated by Haojun Shuai and Ramanujam Nagarajan, who manage volunteer schedules, oversee collections, and ensure rescued food is delivered promptly and safely. Their leadership supports efficient operations while keeping the group’s work firmly rooted in student engagement and community values. Food is collected and redistributed within 15 minutes of pickup, ensuring freshness and removing the need for storage facilities. All items are carefully inspected to meet food safety standards, and any unsuitable food is disposed of responsibly to minimise environmental impact. Coordination is managed through a dedicated WhatsApp group, providing real-time updates on collection times, locations, and quantities. Through this work, the Food Rescue Group at Manchester diverts significant volumes of food from landfill, reduces greenhouse gas emissions, conserves valuable resources, and strengthens community connections. As the group continues to grow, it remains committed to showing how student-led climate action can drive real change, one meal, one volunteer, and one community at a time.

We are a charity called the Wai Yin Society set up by women within the Chinese community initially for Chinese women but which over the years has diversified to include other ethnic minority groups of all genders. Our centre is the Welcome Centre based in Cheetham Hill, Manchester where we serve a highly diverse population in an area of high deprivation. We aim to meet the immediate and practical needs of large numbers of service users as well as provide an easily accessible advice service. We have a community café, an urban farm with chickens and ducks, we run sessions for furniture upcycling and computing skills. We provide welfare and education services including art/calligraphy classes and ESOL classes; a laundry service for the homeless and those in need; basic toiletries; emergency food parcels and a clothes bank. We run gardening sessions at the Welcome Centre as well as at allotments behind the Irish Heritage Centre. We run a work club to help people get back into the job market and IT drop in sessions for those who do not have access to a computer or the internet and cycle repair facilities once a week. The Self Help organisation uses our Centre 3 days a week as a base for seeing clients in the North Manchester area. We host NHS health checks and cancer support groups and run accredited training courses to improve employment prospects. We run advice sessions to help people in crisis, supporting them in applying for various benefits, dealing with debts and a host of everyday problems. In the year between 1st June 2018 and 31st May 2019 we had a footfall of almost 19,000. We provided 6228 hot lunches and 880 emergency food parcels. Lunches cost 50p if service users can afford to pay, otherwise they are provided free. We receive a basic grant from Manchester City Council to provide the emergency food parcels, but this does not cover the cost for the number of people who are being referred to us by Job Centres, Advice Centres, Social Services, Community nurses etc. We go to Fruitful Office once a week to collect fruit and to Costco in Chadderton once a week to collect the donations. These donations are distributed to those in need as well as being used to provide lunches in the Community Cafe. We serve not only the local communities of Cheetham Hill and Crumpsall but people come to us from Blackley, Harpurhey, Moston and as far afield as Ashton and Bolton.

We work with survivors of domestic abuse. We provide services to empower them via emergency food parcels, toiletries, clothing, furniture and a man and van service to help them to quickly move to safety. We also run empowerment workshops to understand what is domestic abuse and giving them tools to recovery, mental health workshops and craft groups to support their wellbeing. We run our own charity shop and community food bank which provides accessible furniture goods and food to the community we support based in the deprived area of Openshaw, East Manchester. Our base creates opportunities for volunteering and rebuilding skills and confidence. We have seen many of our clients move on to work, employment and training. We need support with food donations as we support about 120 people weekly in our food club, people who are on low income and struggling with the high cost of living. We are also in need of a new van that can do our moves to safety to support people moving, our collections and deliveries and we always need manpower in these instances.