There’s enough food, but...One person dies of hunger every 3.6 sec

Bengaluru: One person dies of hunger every 3.6 seconds, say statistics by UNICEF. 75% of these are children. On World Food Day, which was celebrated on Thursday, the employees at Griffith Laboratories in the city took it upon themselves to feed five thousand people across Bengaluru and another 6000 in Delhi.
They also launched the first 'food bank', not for profit organisations that exist across the world to bring food to NGOs and homeless shelters.

At about noon on Thursday, the inmates at Krupalaya, an NGO for aged and disabled people, sat down to a piping hot khichdi meal. The institution is run in what appears to be a large, two-storey house in the bylanes of SG Palya. A card made by the inmates is pinned up on the notice board outside, proudly proclaiming that the food for the day was donated by Griffith Labs, an indication that meals are not easy to come by. Inside, the place is spotless, every inch of the floor has been scrubbed to a shine, beds neatly made and the inmates - some of them very old, others paralysed or afflicted with mental illnesses - are well put together and cheerful.

All this is handled by three nuns - Sr Rincy, Sr Helena and Sr Annriya, along with occasional help from volunteers sent in by St Thomas Church, which runs the NGO and brothers from the school of Theology nearby. “It costs us about Rs 60,000 each month to run the place,” said Sr Rincy, who oversees the daily activities. They buy about 90 kilos of rice a month, along with other provisions like dhal, meat, vegetables, eggs and milk. “We have donations coming in, but they rarely meet our needs," said the soft-spoken Sr Rincy. "Old clothes are what we receive most often, along with the occasional sack of rice or dhal." This is the story everywhere.

While the bigger NGOs have more than they need, the smaller ones deal with a daily struggle for survival. Donations are usually made in kind and people are most forthcoming with second-hand clothes. "We used to shelter 33 kids," said Mr Nagaraj, founder, Nemmadi Mane. "All the expenses I met from my own pocket, but I simply couldn't sustain it. Now, we have 15 kids and six senior citizens." Their monthly food expense is about Rs 12,000, which he manages by running paying guest accommodation for girls. Although he sold the one bit of property he owned to make ends meet, he just about manages to break even.

PB Chinnappa, Director, Supply Chain and Operations, Griffith Labs, arrived at Krupalaya on Thursday, armed with a bags of rice, dhal and vegetables. "The theme of World Food Day this year is 'Feeding the world, caring for the earth'," he explained. "Our aim is provide the needy with nutritious food that suits the local palette," he said, after lunch at Krupalaya. The food bank, which was launched a few hours later, is a charitable organisation that works on the 'warehouse' model.
They collect food from various agencies and store and distribute it to NGOs. The donated food is sorted out and put through a series of quality checks before it is sent out.

The Food Bank was set up by Griffith Labs in collaboration with Grant Thornton. Police Commissioner MN Reddi inaugurated the event, held at the Griffith Labs office in Yelahanka. "We aren't even pitching for an office space, because we want to focus on the actual collection and distribution," said Mr Chinnappa.
They are also hoping to extend this to different offices across the city, so employees can drop a bag of rice or clothes in a donation box that will be picked up each by Griffith. "We are lending our own warehouses to the bank for the moment," he added.