THE Leader was given an eye-opening experience of what goes on behind the scenes at one of the county’s foodbank ahead of the busiest time of the year for them.

The Mold Foodbank, based between the county’s Law Courts and Theatre Clwyd, invited a reporter to spend the morning with a team of volunteers, who all come from a variety of different backgrounds, to get a better understand of what a volunteer at the Foodbank does.

The welcoming team of volunteers shared their stories about how they each decided to help out at the local foodbank and what it means to them.

One volunteer, Mike Allport, told me how he has been volunteering with the foodbank for a number of years.

He said: “I often say to people 'how would you cope without your next few pay slips?' when they ask me about the foodbank, and they all agree that times would get tough and tough decisions would need to be made."

Mike notes that Universal Credit delays have played a big role in the increasing need for foodbanks across the UK

He added: “The initial wait is leaving people hungry as they need to prioritise different things depending on their individual situation. People need to pay their rent or mortgage or face potentially losing the roof from over their head; utility bills need to be paid otherwise they are shut off. In desperate times, people are going without meals in order to prevent their situations from worsening which should not right in this day and age."

Another volunteer who told me about how she started at the local foodbank was Deb Jones.

She said: “I joined after retiring from working in retail for Marks and Spencer. This was a great way to give back to the community I love and, particularly in the warehouse, it is a great means of socialising.

"I would encourage anyone who has retired and has a spare few hours to consider volunteering with their time. As well as getting the job done, we like to have a cup of tea, some biscuits and a natter - we are all good friends here which makes the volunteering work that much more enjoyable."

With the greetings done, I was quickly put to work as part of the team (apron included!).

I learnt that there were four stages to the foodbank process – from the initial donation to the parcel being received.

Between the first and final stages of the process, volunteers like the team in Mold manually sort through pallets of donations made by the likes of local schools, churches, businesses and individuals that donate non-perishable items foodbank that are then distributed to the various local contact points across the county.

I got hands on experience with this stage by helping to label the food that go towards making up the food parcels that come from donations – ensuring that the products were still within their use-by date and then sorted into categories of food, drink and toiletries that make up the finished emergency food parcel.

These parcels consist of three days’ worth of food for one person which consists of “nutritionally balanced, non-perishable tinned and dried foods that have been donated people in the local community” according to the Trussell Trust website.

A typical parcel can contain several items such as pasta, soup, breakfast cereals, tea or coffee, biscuits as well as tinned beans, meat, vegetables and fruit.

Externally, Foodbanks partner with a wide range of care professionals such as doctors, health visitors, social workers and emergency services to identify people in crisis and issue them with a foodbank voucher – which is the third stage in the process.

Finally, people bring these vouchers to a foodbank centre where it can be redeemed for three days’ worth of emergency food. It is here that volunteers also meet people in the community with a warm drink or free hot meal and can help to signpost them towards other agencies that will be able to work on solving any longer-term problems they are facing.

Flintshire Foodbank began in Mold seven years ago in May 2012 and now has eight contact centres across the county operating Monday through Friday – including Connah’s Quay, Shotton, Holywell, Flint, Mold, Buckley, Aston and Saltney – and the demand has never been higher for help when it comes to making ends meet.

The Leader has previously reported that Flintshire Foodbank has given out more than 7,000 emergency parcels in the last year, with two in every five packages going to children.

Data released by the Trussell Trust earlier this year showed that demand for the foodbank services across the county, from April 2018 to March 2019, has grown almost 14 per cent on the previous year.

In total 7,155 emergency food parcels were given to local people in last year, according to Flintshire Foodbank’s figures. Of this number, 3,002 went to children.

The volunteers told me that they were already gearing up for one of the busiest times of the year for the foodbank with Harvest Festival donations set to arrive any day now and then it then becomes a countdown to Christmas – a time of year when use of the facility peaks.

Heading up the Flintshire-based team is Andy and Sue Leake, who have been a part of the foodbank for several years.

Spending a few hours with the team really opened my eyes to the hard work that goes into helping those who are less fortunate – often by no fault of their own.

All the volunteers agreed that giving back to the local community was one of the main things that inspired them to start – and continue – helping out.

The food bank welcomes any new offers of help with funding, making a donation and anyone interested in supporting the foodbank through volunteer work.

If you would like to offer up your spare time as a volunteer with the Flintshire Foodbank, contact Sue or Andy emailing projectmanager@flintshire.foodbank.org.uk or going online to www.trusselltrust.org/get-involved/volunteer/.