Introduction
The People Service Centre (Centre) received funding from the Community Investment and Inclusion Fund (CIIF) of the Labor and Welfare Bureau to implement the “Community Food Mutual Help Internet” project (LWB) in Sham Shui Po and Tuen Mun District from October 2016 to September 2018. The program encouraged participants to partake in food recycling operations in recycling and distribution process. It has helped identifying more families in need of services and connects different resources with them in the community.
The result of the project was very successful. CIIF and CENTRE continue to use the same model to support the implementation of the “Food Friends” – Wong Tai Sin Community Food Networking Project in Wong Tai Sin District. A three-year project has been implemented from October 2018 to September 2021.
Target
- Encourages hidden families in need of food assistance in the community to participate in community activities and build a mutual support network among them
- Facilitates the role transformation of participants, from service beneficiaries to providers, and participate in community services as volunteers.
- Promotes the collaboration of different sectors by giving them to realise their strengths, and build a community of mutual trust and mutual benefit
- The following four types of major collaborations with our partners:
- Community: Organize residents in the community in the collection and dispatch of surplus food
- Social Welfare Organizations: Establish a mutual benefit platform for social welfare groups
- to share resources
- Shops: Recruit shops to donate surplus food to reduce waste
- Universities: Connecting Universities and their students to learn from the service provision
- processes.
Stories
Half a year ago, Mr. Lam came to know the People Service Centre through his family. Being a kindhearted person, he decided to participate in the project. He was impressed by the unfailing efforts of the volunteers. No matter the weather— smoggy, sunny, windy, or chilly, the volunteers come to Jimmy Cake Shop every day to collect surplus breads and buns at end of the day, and sometimes come with their own children. An important factor contributes to the success of this project is the persistence efforts of the suppliers and volunteers. They influence each other, encourage, and motivate each other to advance the missions of the project.
Shun Ha has always been a volunteer in the bread collecting team no mater it is a rainy or sunny one. Sometimes even distributes the breads to neighbors until 11 pm in the evening. She always said she is happy to help whenever she is available. For others, this volunteer job is very time consuming, however, they are life enriching moments to her. It is always her wish to stay in touch with the society. As a recycling volunteer, she can stay in contacts with stall vendors, recipients, and even other volunteers. Now, she goes to the campus to share with the students her works in food recycling (food). She emphasized that she is not a well educated people but she is the one who always take the initiative to have new exposure of life and she has expanded her social circle gradually.
As a tour guide of the food recycling project, Winnie said she has a sense of success whenever she receives positive feedback from the participants. Such sense of achievement not only came from the completion of a three hours long tour guiding service, but also she can share with others of what she believes and value most in her life. The participants becoming more engaging to the project motivated her to keep going. They do not regard the tour just as a lecture. They gave lots of thoughtful suggestions on how to handle the food waste and poverty situations in Hong Kong that help her to keep her perseverance in this volunteer job.
Program Awards
The project and our partners have received the following awards from the Community Investment and Inclusion Fund in recognition of their contributions to the development of social capital.- The People Service Centre 2018 – Logo Award
- The People Service Centre Social Capital Builder Award 2020 –Outstanding Social Capital Project Awards
- Canon (Hong Kong) Corporate Volunteer Team Social Capital Builder Award 2018 – Logo Award
- Student Development Office, City University of Hong Kong Social Capital Builder Award 2018 – Logo Award
- Office of Service-Learning, Lingnan University Social Capital Builder Award 2018 –Outstanding Social Capital Partnership Awards