NGOs nutritional punch for the starving

Call it lack of awareness or carelessness, people in the twin cities particularly those who enjoy attending lunch or dinner or parties organised at private farm houses do not bat even an eyelid in wasting food.

The hotels and restaurants introduce new catchy names to their menu like “Bahubali Thali,” and fascinated by it, people who visit the hotels place an order for such thali more as a matter of prestige and waste the food when they cannot consume the entire quantity.

While such people indulge in criminal wastage of food, there are several people who are starving even for a morsel. Even efforts by many good Samaritans and NGOs to create awareness do not seem to have achieved desired results.

Hence some NGOs who feel that bringing change in the minds of people would take time, evolved a novel way to see that the food does not go down the drain.

‘No Food Waste’ (NFW) is one such organization which combats food wastage. It was founded in 2014 by Padmanabhan and Dinesh in Coimbatore. Elated with the success there, it has been extended to the city of Hyderabad.

Speaking to Hans India, K Venkata Murali, director of the organization said, “Initially, they used to purchase some tiffin packets and serve them to the poor and needy. Later, they formed a team which consists of their family members and friends. This team collects left over (Not from plates) food from the functions and pack them and distribute them to those who have nothing to eat.

Their experience shows that in major functions the left over items consist mostly of rice varieties such as sambar plain rice, Pulihora, curd rice, etc, which they collect and pack them properly and distribute the needy at various points in the city.

They feel that social media can play a major role both in creating awareness in avoiding wasteage of food and the good efforts being made by NGOs. Not just that, the restaurants here should take a leaf from some hotels in Udaipur who have not only put up boards saying that if food is left in their plates, they would be fined. Even while serving they tell the customers that they should take only the quantity they can eat.

NFW said soon they will soon enter into collaboration with various food centres and restaurants to collect the excess food and distribute it to the needy and hungry people.

Another NGO, ‘Glow Tide’ founded by Mustafa Hashmi in 2013 said that they were moved when they saw how some people were trying to beat the hunger by drinking water. They too are collecting excess food from restaurants and function halls, pack them and distribute them to the needy. They have been doing this work mostly in slum areas. Mustafa said that they supply food to over 400 people every day.