'Winter is such an important time for food banks and never more so than in 2021' said Deb Middleton, Trustee and lead co-ordinator for Hope Food North Birmingham The numbers of people visiting food banks increases in winter as a result of a family or individuals financial resources becoming more stretched due to increased household costs such as fuel and lighting.

And the uncertainty that the Covid pandemic created is an added concern this winter. We are currently helping on average 230 adults and children each week and we have only been running 5 months so havent experienced our first winter yet.

Hope Food North Birmingham hands out food bags that provide around 1 2 days worth of meals so there is something for breakfast (cereal and long life milk) something for lunch (baked beans or tinned meat), something for dinner (pasta and pasta sauce) and something sweet (biscuits). And when combined with the fresh fruit, vegetables and bread that visitors to our Hope Food food bank days really do give a good balance to an individuals or families weekly diet. This really is the basics so we've been collecting festive themed items to add to the bags. But what our visitors tell us they really would like is fresh meat and dairy and that's where the Countdown to Christmas appeal comes in. As a new and entirely run charity our resources are very limited. The numbers using our food banks is increasing beyond our initial predictions. So a donation to the Countdown to Christmas appeal will make a huge huge difference to what we provide this Christmas.

Any money raised over this target will go towards providing other essential items.