Uttar Pradesh: Food Bank — 'Ending Hunger, Transforming Lives'
India is home to the largest undernourished and hungry population in the world.
- 15.2% of our population is undernourished
- 194.6 million people go hungry everyday
- 30.7% of children under 5 are underweight
- 58% of children stunted by 2 years of age
- 1 in 4 children malnourished
- 3,000 children in India die every day from poor diet related illness
- 24% of under-five deaths in India
- 30% of neonatal deaths in India
Vision
To eliminate hunger as the cause of lack of protection and education amongst children in Uttar Pradesh.
Mission
To serve the most marginalized sections of the society by making food accessible to them so that they can realize other goals of healthy living, education and safety.
What We Do
The food bank is the support system for those families that struggle every day to make ends meet yet at the end of the day the food that they eat does not provide them the essential nutrition. The Food Bank works with communities to identify such families and support them partially so that they can lead a healthy life and invest in their upliftment. The Food Bank empowers by providing support in crisis, linking them with government programs and schemes.
How the Food Bank Works
The Food Bank is a place where food is donated by individuals, groups as well as directly by companies to the Bank. The bank works as a bridge between the community and the contributor and not just ensures the distribution of food but also ensures that the food reaches the right beneficiaries. Each family that we support becomes a Food Bank Card holder and is not just supported by food but also linked to various other services of health, education, skill development has access to information of government programs and schemes. The beneficiaries are identified through civil society partners and community mobilizers who also monitor the families and support them regularly. The ultimate objective being that food should not be the reason for distress and deprivation of rights of a child. Each city should have one or many such food banks that ensure that no child needs to beg on the streets for food!
Our Vision
To be instrumental in developing systems and a society that is child friendly and protective.
Our Mission
To make sustainable rights based interventions at children, family, society and policy levels to ensure the rights of children especially, those in difficult or vulnerable circumstances.
Our Values
- Every child is unique and should be treated with dignity according to his/her individual needs and circumstances.
- Maintain transparency of policies and programs.
- Making the organization and all beneficiaries self-reliant.
- All actions to be guided in the best interest of children.
- Ensuring Child Rights is a shared responsibility of all concerned.
- Enable children and supporters to contribute through service and sense of duty towards the nation.
Where We Work
BUEGSS works in Barabanki district in Uttar Pradesh, India. Our main office is in the District Headquarter in Barabanki.
How We Ensure Children's Rights
- We reunite children with their families.
- We provide temporary and permanent shelter for homeless children.
- We provide Counselling, Vocational Training and Educational facilities for complete rehabilitation of children we work with.
- We build capacities of families through skill development programs so that they can take better care of their children
- We strengthen the protection net by building capacities of stakeholders on Child Rights through training programs
- We conduct research and studies to build knowledge base on children's issues in Uttar Pradesh.
Origins
Why do children beg? The answer is not simply that every hand is meant to earn food for its own sustenance. If children are begging, it should be viewed as a root cause of child labor; the compulsion for a child to engage in labor is a stain on a civilized society. Recognizing begging—driven by the need to quell hunger—as a facet of child labor, the Barabanki Food Bank was established on October 28, 2017, in collaboration with the organization 'Ehsaas Lucknow'. Through this initiative, food assistance is provided to 100 destitute and helpless children every month. The Food Bank operates by collecting ration donations from the community and distributing them to needy families, acting as a bridge between donors—such as philanthropists and businesspeople—and those in need. In addition to providing food supplies, the initiative also offers educational support and follow-up for the children. Since its inception on October 28, 2017, the Food Bank has consistently provided ration assistance to 100 needy children and their families.