Studying in the middle of the frosty winter…

At the end of a frosty, snowy and gloomy January, we went to, as it turned out, sunny Spain for a study visit. Thanks to a grant obtained from the Active Citizens Program – Regional Fund, we had the opportunity to make a study visit to the Food Bank in Madrid

A few words about our Spanish friends – the Food Bank in Madrid, which has been operating for 30 years, is the largest Food Bank in Spain. It serves the Madrid region, a community of almost seven million people. In 2023, thanks to the help of the Bank of Madrid, 540 Non-Governmental Organizations received food aid, and through them 137 124 people.
Banco de Alimentos Madrid could not operate if it were not for faithful, willing to work and committed volunteers – currently there are 390 volunteers (average age 67 years!!!). 34 employees took up regular employment at the Madrid Bank. Last year, thanks to their hard work food worth EUR 54.1 million reached people in need.

Even though our Bank does not achieve such spectacular results, and in fact we do not achieve results even close to those in Madrid, we were welcomed warmly and friendly, and the management of the Madrid Bank told us in detail about the Bank’s activities. It’s impressive – it really is. Each stage and area of the Bank’s operations in Madrid is well thought out, planned and executed. Each area of the Bank’s operations is controlled and consistent with procedures, and at the same time, all activities are carried out effectively and without unnecessary downtime.

We visited the warehouse in Colegio San Fernando, also the headquarters of the Bank – a building from the 1920s, or more precisely – a former school church and, in contrast, a huge, modern warehouse in Alcala (40 km from Madrid).

We also saw a social shop run by Fundacion Alberto y Elena Cortina – similar to our social shop, but more digitalized. We use paper referrals; in Spain they have cards and barcodes system. On the other hand, they mainly have a fixed and less diversified assortment. In our social shops, where we receive different products every day, introducing an elegant and efficient Spanish system is for now impossible… but not unlikely.

Of course, we wouldn’t forgive ourselves if we didn’t take advantage of the opportunity to visit Madrid briefly – we ate Spanish tapas, saw a bit of Madrid, and even… fought with bulls; virtually, but it also counts. For those interested, we didn’t kill the bull, but we still defeated it!

Our visit inspired us with new ideas to improve our work and, we hope, improve our services, which will bring satisfaction to our customers.

The Organization’s activities in the years 2022-2024 are co-financed by the Norwegian Funds under the Active Citizens Program – Regional Fund.

PM Experts initiative for the Tricity Food Bank

On December 6th, the campaign of PM Experts ( pmexperts.pl ) for the TriCity Food Bank began. The PM Experts team will donate to the Food Bank in Tricity 1% of the revenues obtained from the sale of open training courses purchased in the period from December 6th to December 24th, 2023. Moreover, as part of the “2 chairs” initiative implemented by the company, a representative of the Tricity Food Bank will participate free of charge in the project management training according to the Project Management Institute methodology based on the PMBOK 7th edition. Pm Experts is a training company that has been on the market for 19 years, conducting project management trainings, both dedicated to experienced project managers who want to develop their competences, and to novice project managers who are starting their adventure with project management. They also offer professional consulting, outsourcing and project management software, supporting the daily project managers activities.

As they write about themselves: “We act with passion, and our mission goes beyond business goals. From the very beginning of our company’s existence, activities in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) have been an integral part of our strategy. We want not only create value through our work, but also shape a positive environment for all of us. Our involvement in CSR is based on competence volunteering, where our consultants and representatives share their knowledge and experience. We support non-governmental organizations in gaining project awareness, helping them achieve their goals more effectively statutory purposes.”
Their current action shows that they not only talk and write, but also implement their Corporate Social Responsibility goals. Thanking the PM Experts team for their willingness to support our activities, we hope that this is the beginning of a fruitful and long-term cooperation.

Another Christmas Food Drive completed

It is already an annual tradition – the last Friday and Saturday of November is the date of the nationwide food drive organized by the Federation of Polish Food Banks. On November 24-25, 2023, volunteers of the Food Bank and Partner Organizations once again appeared in stores in the Tricity and Pomeranian Voivodeship, collecting food for people in difficult financial situations. Volunteers could have be found in 56 stores throughout the voivodeship. 15 Partner Organizations of the Food Bank in Tricity took part in the action. Ultimately, after carefully counting the food drive results, we can report that we collected 7,727.49 kg of food with an estimated value of PLN 81,018.29.

Flour was the most popular product donated; we received 1,806 kg of flour; in second place belongs to the products from the “rice, groats, pasta” category, of which we collected 1,646 kg. “Sugar and sweeteners” are products rounding out the podium ; we collected 1,023 kg of them. Just behind the podium are chocolates and sweets, with the results – 658 kg.
We would like to thank all the people who wanted to donate food to us, and we congratulate our Partner Organizations on the results. First of all, we would like to express our gratitude to our volunteers who, with a smile on their faces, enthusiasm and perseverance, stand in stores for hours handing out information leaflets and inviting people to share food. Without you, our dear volunteers, neither this nor any other collection would take place. Thank you.
At the same time, we invite you to support the Christmas Food Drive online on the website zbiorkazywnosci.pl .

Travel educates, or how the TriCity Food Bank visited Berliner Tafel…

Berlin – Alexander Platz, curry wurst, Parthenon, Berlin Wall and Zoo Station – a city of museums, monuments, the seat of the German government… what do you associate Berlin with? From now on, we will associate the city with Berliner Tafel – the Berlin Food Bank, which we visited at the end of October. How did this happen? We sat down, thought, wondered how we could learn and came up with the idea that maybe we would watch how Food Banks work in Poland and neighboring countries. We financed the visit as part of a grant financed by the Norwegian Funds under the Active Citizens – Regional Fund Program.

We visited the headquarters of Berliner Tafel, their charity shop and the food distribution point.
Berliner Tafel it is, above all, impressive numbers – 5 fundraisers, 19 employees, 30 cars, 2,000 volunteers and over 200,000 people who receive help. It’s impressive, isn’t it? Berliner Tafel is an institution – if there is excess food in a restaurant, grocery store or food market that could have been vasted, the first idea that comes to the management’s mind is to donate the excess food to Berliner Tafel. It would have been great if the same happened to the TriCity Food Bank. But we know it will happen some day.
The person who founded Berliner Tafel, and who is now an extremely active member of the organization and even a woman-institution, is Sabine Werth. She started by carrying bread from a nearby restaurant in nets, and today she helps 200,000 people.
Berliner Tafel is also a very well-organized “enterprise” – the movement of cars distributing food is supervised by a computer system. The system was created by a start-up and Berliner Tafel offered to try it out as part of a test run within their organization. Today, the system is implemented in companies and still allows to supervise car movements in Berliner Tafel. Due to the large amount of food distributed in the warehouse and between the warehouse and the distribution points, there are many plastic containers; Berliner Tafel uses a system of arranging containers according to size, so that you do not have to look for a container that will fit a specific amount of food. Specialized washing machines were purchased to wash the containers. They are operated by specially trained employees.
Interestingly, Berliner Tafel is financed only thanks to private donations; the organization does not receive funding from the state, region or city. This approach, of course, requires a lot of effort from fundraisers and Sabine herself, who tries to promote the idea of Berliner Tafel as widely as possible.

Berliner Tafel, in addition to supporting non-governmental organizations, also issues food packages. You can receive a parcel once a week, only in the district where you live and you must prove that you are a person with a low income or in a difficult life situation. We accompanied volunteers during the packages distribution. People in need register in a notebook and mark the dates on which they collected food. Upon release, each person in need receives a card with information on what day and time they should appear again to receive food parcel. Food distribution is handled by volunteers; the prepared packages contain vegetables, fruit, semi-finished products, some sweet additives and dairy products. The parcels are prepared at the Berliner Tafel warehouse on the same day, mainly from food close to expiry date.
The time spent at Berliner Tafel was extremely intense and informative. And we saw what we can aspire to. I they succeeded, why not us?

The organization’s activities in 2022-24 are co-financed by the Norwegian Funds under the Active Citizens Program – Regional Fund.
#activecitizensregionalfund #education #institutionalgrant #BerlinerTafel #welearn

Partnership with Oetker – pizzerias that reach further

Oetker provided us with a donation of pizzerias. Almost 6,000 pizzerias found their way to our organizations
Partners, and through them – to people in need in Pomerania. Thanks to the donation, the Organizations will be able to support disabled people, seniors, refugees and children who experience difficulties every day.
We would like to thank Oetker for its help and our Partner Organizations for their commitment and support. Thank you for being with us. Together we offer not only food, but also hope and smiles.

Our new magazine almost ready

The warehouse may not be the heart (because the heart is the employees and volunteers), but it is definitely the respiratory system of the Food Bank. Those of you who have seen our magazine know that these respiratory system sometimes was short of breath. That is why we were looking for the possibility of financing the construction of a bigger warehouse … and we succeeded. Thanks to the funding from the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management, we received money for the construction of a warehouse, the Municipality of Gdynia gave us the land, we chose the contractor, and the contractor built the magazine. Now we are waiting for the utilities operators to make the connections and inspections to approve the warehouse to operate.
We have very ambitious plans for the warehouse – we want it to be environmentally neutral and self-sufficient in terms of heating and electricity. That is why we plan to install photovoltaics and heating pumps. We have already submitted an appropriate application for funding to the Agency for Restructuring and Modernization of Agriculture.

Never enough of learning

The development of the organization is not only new members and new activities, but also continuous learning. Regulations, innovative solutions, new ideas and new data – all this means that we have to adapt to the changing reality. And we won’t do that without constant learning. That is why, as part of a grant financed by the National Freedom Institute NOWEFIO program, we invited our partner organizations to a series of trainings. The first three trainings – on food safety, HACCP standards and accounting in a non-governmental organization – were organized in August. September is the month in which we will train in fundraising, i.e. raising funds for the organization’s activities.

Social Shops for Everyone

When at the beginning of 2022 we started the “Social Stores For Everyone” project, it seemed that after many months of the pandemic, we were slowly regaining stability. We wanted to use the coming year and a half to turn three social shops in Gdynia and Gdańsk into centers of neighborly cooperation, self-help and self-advocacy. However, it quickly turned out how true the saying is that if you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans…
The outbreak of war in Ukraine, the refugee and economic crisis forced us to review our intentions. And fortunately, because without a flexible approach, we would not be able to achieve results together. Effects that we may not have expected, but which are a significant contribution to the activities of Social Shops and show the direction in which we should develop these facilities.
How to effectively support people at risk of exclusion? What should the cooperation between aid centers and non-governmental organizations look like? What is the potential of neighborly cooperation? The answers to these and many other questions can be found in the publication “Social Stores For Everyone”.