Mass potato donation provides staple for over 5 million meals countrywide

FoodForward SA (FFSA) has secured a mass donation of potatoes until the end of harvest season in October / November, equating to 3,840 tons which will provide over 15 million meals across the country.

With food prices in South Africa soaring, many families are finding it increasingly challenging to put food on their tables, even struggling to procure those foods that used to be cost-effective nutritious options.

The cost of potatoes increased by 51.9% between December 2022 and December 2023. This donation comes as a crucial lifeline for countless individuals and households facing food insecurity.

Potatoes are a versatile, affordable, and nutritious staple that can significantly contribute to alleviating food insecurity. These donated potatoes offer a practical solution by providing a reliable source of nutrition that can be prepared in various ways to create hearty and filling meals to feed the most vulnerable.

Provided they are stored properly, potatoes also have a longer shelf life, making them ideal for distribution and storage in communities with limited resources. This makes potatoes especially valuable in FFSA's mission to fight hunger and malnutrition.

Through a generous collaborative effort between One Farm Share, an initiative of powered by Standard Bank in partnership with HelloChoice, The People of South Africa Foundation NPC, the humanitarian arm of We Are South Africans, and farmers from the Free State and Christiana in the North West province, FoodForward SA has consistently been receiving five truckloads of potatoes every week, to be distributed to FFSA’s branches in all provinces around the country.

“At FFSA, we prioritise the recovery of on-farm surplus and out-of-spec produce,” says Andy Du Plessis, FFSA’s managing director. “By collaborating with farmers directly and through our partnership with OneFarm Share, we ensure a steady supply of fresh produce coming into all of their nine branches countrywide, allowing for a cost per meal of just R0,47.”

Thanks to FFSA’s extensive warehouse and logistics infrastructure, including refrigerated trucks with cold chain capabilities, the organization can efficiently collect and transport fresh produce. This prevents spoilage and wastage, ensuring that nutritious food reaches vulnerable communities, including those impacted by recent floods in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces. This donation will help provide nutritious food to those who have lost their homes and livelihoods during these challenging times. FoodForward SA’s efforts will be coordinated with local disaster management teams to ensure the efficient distribution of potatoes to the affected areas.

The consequence of increasing food costs and limited access to nutritious, healthy foods means that many people rely on cheaper less nutritious and even unhealthy foods or unsafe foods, which can lead to diet-related diseases, as well as compromise the optimal growth and development of children, sometimes even leading to death.

FFSA's strategy is to focus on the distribution of mainly nutritious foods, by collaborating with the role-players within the food supply chain to donate good quality surplus food instead of dumping it.

Through its network of 2,500 vetted beneficiary organisations, FFSA ensures that healthy, nutritious food reaches those that need it most, to support the health and wellbeing of over 920,000 vulnerable adults, especially women, children, and the elderly, every day.

“The need for food relief is greater than ever, with millions of South Africans unsure of where their next meal will come from,” says Grant Jacobs from OneFarm Share. “While farmers are aware of this need, many are unable to assist due to the cost of logistics. Our OneFarm Share platform brings all the role players together. It’s through this type of concerted collaboration that this mass potato donation was made possible. We’d like to thank We are South African, FoodForward SA, our contributing farmers, and all our partners who helped to make this possible, and who have worked so hard to enable more families access to nutritious food”

“Our partnership with OneFarm Share has been instrumental in reducing food loss and waste on farms, accelerating smallholder farmer development, while ensuring surplus fresh produce with no market access reaches vulnerable communities,” says Du Plessis. “An enormous thank you to them and to The People of South Africa Foundation NPC, the humanitarian arm of We are South Africans, which has facilitated the donation.”

“This movement of potatoes nationwide is nothing short of a remarkable human feat, thousands of hands joining in from around the country to ensure the most vulnerable people have a staple. Our partnership with FoodForward SA is strategic, so that we don’t duplicate donations to beneficiaries we both serve and to maximise our and their ability to help many people in need as quickly as possible but also the providing them with the most valuable of all donations, knowing that they are not alone. We urge donors to continue donating to organisations like ourselves and FoodForward SA to help us move these mountains for those who have no other place to be helped.” says Gilbert Martin, media relations for We are South Africans / People of South Africa Foundation.