Shropshire Star

Shrewsbury Community fridge for surplus food opens its doors

A town's first community fridge has opened its doors to share surplus chilled food in a bid to cut food waste.

Published

Shrewsbury Food Hub and Riversway Elim Church have teamed up and the fridge was opened by town Mayor Councillor Peter Nutting.

Katy Anderson, co-founder of the Shrewsbury Food Hub, said: “We’re on a mission to stop food waste in Shrewsbury.

"Since we started two and a half years ago, we’ve collected 66 tonnes of bread, fruit, veg and store cupboard food from the supermarkets which would otherwise have ended up in the bin.

"That’s enough for 157,000 meals which have been shared between community groups like the Ark, Food Bank Plus, Severn Hospice, schools and playgroups. This food saves groups like the hospice 30 per cent of their food budget.

“However, there is still a lot of chilled food which still ends up in the bin at stores. Chilled food needs a lot more care to make sure that it’s safe, so we’ve done a pilot with Midcounties Co-op to collect frozen food and get our food safety right.

“Moving into chilled food is a bit of an experiment, as we’re not sure how much is out there, but we’re hoping that we’ll be able to provide a steady supply of high-value chilled foods like meat, fish, milk and cheese for community group and #foodshare community fridges and freezers over the coming year.”

Sue Briggs, from Riversway, added: “We’re really excited to host Shrewsbury’s first community fridge, with delicious food supplied by Pret a Manger and Greggs.

"We already run a #foodshare table every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday where people can come and help themselves to surplus food. The community fridge makes new types of food available like sandwiches, salads and yoghurts.”

If you’d like to volunteer to collect food for the new fridge please contact Shrewsbury Food Hub or go to shrewsburyfoodhub.org.uk