Since November 2022, City Harvest has provided five of London Early Years Foundation’s settings with surplus food, which has been used to make over 60,000 meals for children, saving the social enterprise over £11,000 in the first five months (November – April).
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The money saved through the scheme has been used to pay for 15 hours of nursery care, on top of the universal 15 hours, for a child attending LEYF’s Burgess Park nursery in Southwark.
The partnership is now being expanded to a further five settings, saving LEYF a total of £40,000, which will provide five children with a years’ worth of additional nursery hours.
It costs LEYF £8,000 to provide an additional 15 hours a week, on top of the universal 15 hours, for one child over the course of a year.
The scheme forms part of LEYF’s Doubling Down programme to provide children ‘locked’ out of the 30 hours childcare because their parents are either unemployed or on low wages, with an additional 15 hours a week in nursery.
As well as funding additional hours and reducing food waste, the social enterprise says other positives to come out of the partnership include:
- An improvement in children’s cultural capital through being able to try new foods, such as purple carrots and Asian pears.
- Being able to use the surplus food in the food banks LEYF runs within three of its settings for ‘struggling’ families.
'This new initiative means we can add even more value to a child’s early years education.'
June O’Sullivan, chief executive of London Early Years Foundation, said, ‘For many years we’ve been tackling food waste and food poverty to help those families faced with disadvantage and struggling with the cost of living.
'This new initiative with City Harvest now means we can add even more value to a child’s early years education by providing these crucial extra Government funded hours to some of the children who need it the most. This will help them level up and reduce the attainment gap that emerges from 22 months in children from poorer backgrounds.’
Sarah Calcutt, City Harvest chief executive, added, ‘Through free food, we're able to bridge social inequalities that no one child should suffer in 2023.
‘Improving the diets of children at risk of malnutrition and enabling additional permanent nursery places for those unable to access the same level of Early Years education and care is key. We hope that together we can continue to have a positive impact on the most vulnerable children in our city.’