ALDI CARDIFF DISTRIBUTION CENTRE

We love our city of Cardiff. We believe eliminating food poverty is within our grasp. We believe that empowering individuals, and groups to believe that their simple contribution can make a huge difference, is key. Food poverty is a reality. It’s in every corner of society. A common topic of conversation in our communities and culture. Frequently discussed, researched, investigated, but it continues. At Food4All we operate to make it simple for any willing volunteers to bring food to anyone who can benefit from it. Our volunteers might work in schools, volunteer with community groups, support those elderly or vulnerable, work within schools, mosques, churches, leisure centres! The list goes on and whether big or small, we simply help them all. Volunteers register with the Food4All leadership team. We discuss their community involvement and agree on a weekly plan of food collections. The volunteers are then linked with individual local stores, and supported by the Food4All team to collect donated food on a weekly basis. As a team of around 30 volunteers, we all work together to share, support and encourage. We work 365 days of the year. We support Food Banks, support schools by supplying food for their breakfast clubs, parent cookery classes; food for pensioners in retirement accommodation, asylum seekers and refugees as well as families in need who have vulnerable family members and much more, together reaching hundreds of households each week in Cardiff and the surrounding areas. We are grateful for every single crate, every loaf of bread, every bag of salad, every croissant! Each item represents our opportunity and hope that in sharing, maybe, just maybe one person that day will have a reason to hope. That they would know they are not alone, and that they too would have a hope for the future. Throughout the week: Free food available to the community from Al-Ikhlas Mosque, Cardiff, where individuals and families come together and help themselves to whatever they need in a warm and friendly environment. Deliver food parcels to the breakfast club in Splott as well as a the Star centre. Also providing vital food supplies to those in need in the Ely area of Cardiff via the Dusty Forge and St Vincent's Church. Providing food to support parents at cookery classes and the breakfast club at Cathays High School, supporting families in need. Supporting individuals and families in need in the deprived inner city areas of Cardiff (Splott, Adamsdown and Tremorfa) by delivering directly to the Mosques to support their food markets as well as individual families. Saturday: Fortnightly free food markets running in Llanishen. Supported by Llanishen Baptist church and Llanishen Catholic Church. Providing essential food support for pensioners in Llanbradach, Rhondda Cynon Taff. Free food open to the community from both Al Manar and Mosque Omar where people come together and help themselves to whatever they need.

We run weekly cookery sessions and provide lunch for between 100-160 individuals on a daily basis (Mon-Fri). We provide and run various women only sessions, craft sessions and language classes as well as a range of other activities for men, women and children. The kitchen is often the centre of our services! We opened on 30 September 2008. In the first three weeks we had between 25-44 visitors. Now that has increased to 100-160 visitors per day. These have included people from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan, Mali and Congo, among many other countries. Some have just arrived in Cardiff, whilst others have been here for a few years. We have established links with the Community Police, Cardiff Council and other drop in centres. Sessions have been run by a variety of different organisations and continue to run throughout the year. Those that come are welcome to give their ideas on how to improve our services.

To promote the benefit of the inhabitants of butetown and the neighbourhood without distinction of sex or of political, religious or other opinions, to advance education and to provide facilities in the interest of social welfare for recreation and leisure time with the object of improving the conditions of life for the said inhabitants.