Food Charity Urging Fresh Fruit Suppliers to Help Kids Load Up for Breakfast

12 Aug 2016 --- As the clock counts down to the start of the new school term, food charity FareShare is gearing up for its back to school fruit appeal.

The non-profit UK redistribution charity is calling for more fresh fruit suppliers to provide surplus produce to the charity to help hundreds of breakfast clubs give schoolkids a healthy start to the day.

Children who eat a healthy breakfast before the start of the school day benefit from better concentration levels and are twice as likely to perform well in tests, according to FareShare.

However, some low-income families across the UK struggle to provide healthy options like fresh fruit for their kids’ breakfast.

Breakfast clubs help to fill this gap by providing some children who don’t get too much fruit at home, with nutritious food.

Last school year FareShare supported 324 breakfast clubs, an increase of 14 percent. Fruit was particularly in demand because it is healthy and easy to serve. The demand is expected to grow as more schools join the Sugar Smart program and swap high-sugar fruit juices for more natural alternatives. 

The Sugar Smart app teaches kids and their parents how much sugar is packed into food, especially sugars lurking in junk food and popular snacks and convenience foods. It’s part of a wider drive to reduce sugar content and raise awareness of sugar’s contribution to the global obesity problem. 

FareShare already works in partnership with AMT Fruit, IPL, Mack, Richard Hochfeld, Rodanto and Worldwide Fruit, but it keen to partner with more fresh fruit supplier to redistribute surplus produce that may be “slightly less than perfect” but is still good to eat. 

“Easy to prepare fruit like bananas, satsumas and melon are particularly welcome by breakfast clubs. “No matter how efficient food businesses are, it’s inevitable that at some point they will find themselves with surplus produce for a whole host of reasons, from weather changes to order changes or produce becoming out of spec,” says FareShare commercial manager, Colin Burcombe.

“We’re appealing to fresh fruit supplier to work with us to ensure their surplus is put to the best possible use, so that children can enjoy a healthy start to the day and a good start to life.”