LI life By Rhys Jones, Joana Ferro and Samuel Perry
Food Stories and Lessons from Lambeth The Autumn 2019 edition of the journal introduced the work of the Humanitarian Landscape Collective. Here is an update on their work on food security from the past year.
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n November 2019, just before the pandemic struck, The Trussell Trust reported that between 8-10% of households in the UK were described as “food insecure”1, and that Trussell’s network of food banks had seen the number of emergency food parcels provided to people in crisis increase by 73% over the previous 5 years2. It’s hard to draw comparisons we reached out to local charities and between pre- and post-lockdown community groups to understand the figures, but it is estimated that food extent of the emergency response insecurity amongst adults quadrupled and how to address the crisis. during the first lockdown due to a Some of our network were based combination of food shortages in in the Lambeth area, so we linked shops, a loss of income or a need to up with the Lambeth Mutual Aid self-isolate3. The pandemic has made it Group, a collective of individuals and very clear how unequal, unsustainable organisations who came together and fragile certain aspects of our food during the pandemic to support system are, mostly affecting groups their neighbourhood’s vulnerable such as the elderly, BAME households, members. Through their virtual and disabled people4. meetings, we heard the stories and The Humanitarian Landscape realities of grassroots organisations Collective is a network of like-minded and community groups battling to built environment professionals, feed their vulnerable neighbours with academics and NGOs who want to little to no government support. We use our skills to address society’s learnt that food banks were facing an greatest challenges. We saw the crisis unprecedented surge in demand, and at home as being too big to ignore, so the concerning gap between their 64
supply and demand mobilised us to address the food shortfall. We reached out to community gardens, allotments, and city farms across London to source surplus fresh produce, but they all had the same answer: “…you’re too late, we’ve already harvested everything.” It turned out that the pandemic coincided with the ‘Hungry Gap’, a period between harvesting the winter crops and sowing new crops in the spring. Although there was no surplus produce to be found, our efforts did yield an idea from one allotment owner: to make the most of the Clap for Carers movement on Thursdays to encourage food bank donations. Organised through neighbourhood WhatsApp and Facebook groups, neighbours were asked to leave one item of food on their doorstep and nominate someone to collect and later drop off the donations at their local food bank. We named this the Food Share Initiative and spread the word as far as we could, picking up interest from as far as Manchester and Gloucestershire, with our Facebook profile recording 15,000 views in just two days. Recording the impact at this initial stage was challenging, but we asked people to take photographs of their donations as they scurried up and down their streets at 8:05pm picking up tins and packets of food to donate. Although food banks have a purpose in catering to immediate food shortages, they are, however, not a long-term answer to food insecurity. If we want to push for a more equitable and environmentally sustainable food system, we will need to address the issues through all levels of society. For
The Trussell Trust, 2019. State of Hunger. https:// www.stateofhunger. org/wp-content/ uploads/2019/11/ State-of-Hunger-ReportNovember2019-Digital. pdf 1
The Trussell Trust, 2019. https://www. stateofhunger.org/ 2
King’s College London, 2020. Vulnerability to food insecurity since the COVID-19 lockdown. https://foodfoundation. org.uk/publication/ vulnerability-to-foodinsecurity-since-thecovid-19-lockdown/ 3
Cetin, E., P., d., 2020. Black people, racism and human rights: understanding food poverty. https://committees. parliament.uk/ writtenevidence/11581/ html/#_ftnref11 4
