People needed to know how much food they should buy or cook every day. Don't damage the environment through our plates.
By
Satrio Pangarso Wisanggeni, Albertus Krisna and M Puteri Rosalina
·6 minutes read
On Thursday afternoon (28/4/2022), a classroom at Mawar Sandi PAUD preschool in Manggarai, South Jakarta, was transformed into a kitchen. The rows of small tables held bottles of sauce, soy sauce, cooking oil, rice, and vegetables. Dozens of empty boxes of rice were on the floor. Indri (54) had been standing in front of the stove for around four hours, cooking dozens of servings of fried fish, chicken in soy sauce, fried vermicelli, and chap chai (stir-fried) vegetables.
That day, there was a target to cook around 100 servings of boxed meals. Eight of Indri’s colleagues were tasked with wrapping the rice and placing one in each box.
Indri, who has taught at various early childhood education (PAUD) schools in Jakarta over many years, was volunteering with the Food Kitchen run by the Foodbank of Indonesia (FOI) that afternoon. Her job was to turn food donations into an iftar meal for her 78 students, most of who come from underprivileged families, as well as a nearby community of elderly scavengers.
"By becoming a volunteer with FOI, I can help [people] who are less fortunate, even though the PAUD teacher salary is small," she said, smiling.
The FOI Food Kitchen in Manggarai is open three days each week, from Thursday to Saturday. The team of volunteers is led by Sri Utami “Tuti” Satriastuti, principal of Mawar Sandi PAUD school.
Tuti said that Mawar Sandi PAUD teachers started volunteering with the FOI Food Kitchen in 2018. The FOI provides ingredients at least once a week for its Food Kitchen volunteers to turn into meals.
Mawar Sandi PAUD, said Tuti, paid special attention to children from underprivileged families.
“We want children to be healthy, smart, and have good character. We can only achieve this if there is maximum nutritional fulfillment,” she said.
At 3:30 p.m., a red box truck arrived and parked in front of the school. The boxed meals were each placed in a white plastic bag and then taken to the truck.
Each bag contained more than a boxed meal of rice and fried fish. It also had bread donated by a well-known bakery that operates its outlets in many shopping centers.
The students’ parents were notified by WhatsApp, and soon, the students arrived, accompanied by their parents. Many came on foot, while others rode motorcycles, and still others came pushing scavenger carts.
Dea (5), a girl with bangs, came with her older brother Dias (7), sitting in a cart pulled by their mother Yanti (32).
Dea stood in the line at the truck, standing behind the wooden block that marked the line. As soon as she received her bag from Indri, she immediately gave it to her mother, who put the bag into the cart.
For Yanti, the food aid helped meet the nutritional needs of Dea and Dias and came at the right time, because she had made very little income over the last few days.
Yanti and her husband usually earn Rp 70,000 each day from scavenging. However, the previous day, Yanti didn't go out to work. “Yesterday, right, there were a lot of tramtib (security patrols), so there was no (income). We could not go out, because the tramtib will prevent us. So yesterday, I didn't go out," said Yanti, chuckling softly.
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The Food Kitchen is one of the programs run by the FOI, a nonprofit food bank that was founded by Muhammad Hendro Utomo in 2015. Hendro said that Indonesians traditionally gave out food. "For example, if we are cooking and a neighbor smells the food, we must give some to them," he said.
According to the FOI’s report dated April 28, 2022, the organization distributed 4,634 tons of food and groceries to 348,133 children, the elderly, informal workers, and victims of natural disasters in 2017-2021.
Its donors comprise various businesses, such as supermarkets, packaged food manufacturers, and bakeries. One of these is Super Indo, which has been a partner since 2018. The supermarket chain donates food that is no longer good for retailing, but can still be used as ingredients at the FOI's Food Kitchens. From 2018 to 2021, Super Indo donated 558 tons of food.
FOI's donors are not just big retailers like Super Indo. Many traditional vegetable traders also contribute. Vegetable traders at East Tebet Market in Jakarta have been donating unsold vegetables to the FOI since April 2022.
One regular donor is trader Sutarmi (45). She said she was happy that other people could use the leftover vegetables. "We don't ask for anything in return, because [leftover vegetables] are usually thrown away. If someone else can use them, it is better," she said.
The vegetables donated by traders from East Tebet Market were used by Indri, Tutik, and other Food Kitchen volunteers at Mawar Sandi PAUD, Manggarai, in preparing meals for their students.
Just like hands
A number of organizations in Surakarta, Central Java, also donate surplus food. For example, the environmental nonprofit organization Gita Pertiwi is collaborating with the Carefood community and the Surakarta Healthy Food Community (Konpasera) to connect producers with surplus food with people in need.
Carefood members serve as “hands”. They pick up the food donations, check their quality, and distribute them to the needy. Carefood secretary Widihantoro said the process must be fast so the food did not spoil. "The food pickup and distribution should be done within three hours," he said.
Carefood usually receives raw ingredients, while Konpasera is in charge of cooking them. So far, caterers, hotels and restaurants have collaborated with Gita Pertiwi. Atiek Dewanto, an entrepreneur who runs the Dahar Eco catering business, said she was glad that Carefood and Gita Pertiwi could help her manage surplus food.
Don't damage the environment through our plates.
"If there is excess food, I immediately call Gita Pertiwi," she said. However, she added, only seven out of around 250 caterers in Surakarta had joined the program.
According to Gita Pertiwi head Titik Sasanti, the organization’s activities were intended to ensure food security for the people of Surakarta. A survey Gita Pertiwi conducted in 2019 showed that many restaurants and hotels often threw away surplus food, whereas many people were still in need.
“In hotels, around 12 percent of the food served has the potential to become food waste,” said Titik. The average figure was 10 percent for catering businesses and 9 percent for restaurants.
Therefore, Titik said, people needed to know how much food they should buy or cook every day. "Don't damage the environment through our plates," said Titik.