(Part 4)
Before we describe in greater detail the activities of the Philippine Food Bank Foundation as a possible template for other private citizens to replicate in regions outside the leading urban centers in the Philippines, let us report on what the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) recently launched as the first in-country innovation competition in search of local solutions to address food insecurity in the Philippines.
Food banking may connote to the ordinary citizens a formal organization that is beyond their capacity to establish and operate. That is why the WFP is promoting this initiative called the Preparedness and Response Excellence in the Philippine (PREP) Program — supported by USAID, the Australian’s Government Department of Foreign Affairs and others — which is inviting local innovators to propose low- and high-tech solutions that will help combat food insecurity, especially in disaster-prone areas of the archipelago. Innovators may apply to one or both of two priority areas: enhancing emergency preparedness to build resilience or increasing efficiency and effectiveness in humanitarian response.
All types of entities, including government at all levels, local organizations, foundations, academia, and private individuals are encouraged to apply. The innovation proposal must target at least one of the following provinces: Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, Surigao del Norte, Dinagat Islands, Albay, Catanduanes, Cagayan, and Isabela. This program marks the commitment of WFP to help pilot and scale up existing innovative approaches to end hunger in the Philippines, in close partnership and support of the government, donors, and partners. Once again this is the application of the principle of subsidiarity through which individuals are enabled to contribute their efforts to address a social problem.
An international example of an individual effort to contribute to alleviating hunger is what was reported by AFP about a Palestinian food blogger, Hamada Shaquora. To satisfy his craving for comfort food on a war-rations diet, he taught himself to cook, using food aid packages and whatever fresh vegetable he could scrounge up. His cuisine includes beef tacos “Gaza style,” pizza wraps, and a deep-fried “golden sandwich” which he films then offers up to the tent camp’s hungry children. Barefoot children toting empty pots and bowls run through the ruins of Khan Yunis to his tent, where the war chef cooks up pea stew in huge pots over an open fire. This example illustrates what can be done by an individual to fight hunger. In the Philippines, there are examples of housewives who pool their resources together and cook nutritious dishes in their homes that they distribute to poor communities near their residences.
On the institutional level, let me cite the case of Kenny Rogers Roasters, the famous restaurant chain. It launched the Farm Advocacy Program (FAP) three years ago. FAP is a farm-to-table program in which every purchase of a select Kenny Roasters menu item supports local farmers. In 2024, the fundraising menu item is the Chimichurri Roast, the ingredients of which are sourced locally. Sales of the popular roasted item supported an NGO called Urban Farmers PH, a group that promotes the use of idle public spaces for farming. The P300,000 raised was used by Urban Farmers PH to support the Taguig Integrated School and Barrio Obrero Elementary School to provide essential resources to make plant beds, seedling nurseries, and provide technical training in urban planning.
Something similar is being implemented in Pasig by one of the leading seed companies, Harbest, in training street sweepers to plant high-value vegetables and fruits in empty public plots. Harbest also is providing residents of condominiums with the technology and tools to plant the same high-value vegetables along the walls of their residences through hydroponics.
Let me now briefly described the Philippine Foodbank Foundation, Inc., an NGO put together by some members of the Philippine business community and civil society. One can read on its website that this SEC-registered foundation aims, through strategic partnerships, to secure surplus food products from various sources and redistribute them to marginalized communities with the help of grassroots movements. Its main goals are hunger relief (distributing surplus food to religious orphanages, schools, parishes, and other charitable institutions in communities in need); food waste reduction (through collaborating with food businesses to minimize excess food and waste added to landfills); increase learning abilities or reduce learning poverty (by providing nourishment, especially for children during the first two years of their lives in order to prevent brain damage or stunting); and community empowerment (by providing nutrition education and supporting local initiatives to attain zero hunger).
At the heart of the mission of the Philippine Food Bank Foundation is the belief that no one should go hungry. Through an innovative food rescue and logistics program, the Foundation strives to provide nourishment and hope to those in need while simultaneously addressing the pressing issue of food waste. In fact, there is an ongoing process of working with the officials of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to find ways and means for food banks to obtain carbon credits for their contribution to a cleaner environment by reducing food waste that is thrown into landfills.
One of the largest initiatives of a multinational corporation to address hunger in the Philippines, in partnership with the Philippine Food Bank Foundation (PFBF), is that of Starbucks. In March 2022, Starbucks partnered with PFBF and Grab Philippines to launch its FoodShare food donation program. Under this program, Starbucks donates rescuable food items to select beneficiaries, first in the National Capital Region and subsequently in Cebu, Iloilo, Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Southern Luzon, and Central Luzon. Participating stores are connected to Grab drivers who pick up their food donations and deliver them to local non-profit organizations who have been targeted as beneficiaries by PFBF.
To cite a few examples from the over 100 institutional beneficiaries of PFBF, Starbucks interviewed Marko Lim, a Volunteer Project Leader who was in charge of receiving food donations for the National Children’s Hospital (NCH) that provides quality care to children ages zero to 19. According to Mr. Lim, the hospital has been the frontrunner in the care of pediatric patients in different stages of life with different types of diseases. When asked about their experience with FoodShare, Mr. Lim mentioned that the NCH receives delicious snacks for the children, parents and frontliners in the facility weekly. He said that the problem of hunger persists, but with the help of determined socially responsible and action-oriented companies like Starbucks Philippines, they are able to be part of the solution.
Another institutional beneficiary of the FoodShare program is the Oasis of Joy for Young Girls, a child-caring home and welfare agency that provides alternative parental care and fostering in a wholesome environment to neglected, surrendered, orphaned, abandoned, and foundling female children from ages three to 12. Currently, the home is caring for 16 children with four religious nuns who manage and organize the daily activities with the help of two house mothers. Food is donated to this institution regularly through the FoodShare program. According to Sr. Liezel D. Cantara, Finance Officer of Oasis: “The delicious bread that Starbucks shares with us on a daily basis is very helpful. It does not only help the children but goes a long way to help feed our communities, staff and mothers as well.”
More than 200 Starbucks stores — and counting — are involved as more regions in the Visayas and Mindanao are getting involved. Through the example of Starbucks (and more recently Subway), the Philippine Food Bank Foundation hopes to involve many more restaurant chains — both local and foreign — to participate in this very worthy cause that simultaneously addresses the problems of hunger, the quality of education, and climate change.
Bernardo M. Villegas has a Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard, is professor emeritus at the University of Asia and the Pacific, and a visiting professor at the IESE Business School in Barcelona, Spain. He was a member of the 1986 Constitutional Commission.
