New Chapter for Vital Local Food Charity
Rima Sams, Founder and Director of Sustenance by Michael Donald
Established in 2021, St Leonard’s and Hastings community kitchen and food support initiative, Karmabank, has re-launched as Sustenance – a unique charity committed to addressing food inequalities by repurposing surplus produce, providing nutritious food for those most in need and championing climate-friendly food preservation.
Every Thursday at Concordia Hall, Sustenance provides a three-course hot meal cooked by committed local volunteer chefs, along with bags of groceries, fruit and vegetables, to people from many different backgrounds. From lifelong residents of Hastings to Syrian and Sudanese refugees, as well as Ukrainian families fleeing the war.
Sustenance users are referred by local organisations, with nearly 300 currently registered – and up to 70 attending every week. They may be single people living alone, small groups or multi-generational families. Some are in work receiving minimum wage and still struggling to afford to buy enough fresh fruit and vegetables to eat a balanced and nutritious diet. Members sit together, eat together and swap their stories and sometimes, the contents of their shopping bags – creating a real community environment.
Owen Vidler
Rima Sams, Sustenance Founder and Managing Director, says: “This incredible project has brought together my passion for cooking good food, addressing food poverty and wasting less; as well as exploring climate-friendly food preservation techniques. To be able to make such a difference to so many people could never have happened without the collective support and dedication of our amazing volunteers, food providers and supporters. I am so grateful. Now Sustenance is a charity, the sky’s the limit.”
Volunteer Madeleine Mason comments: “To see someone arrive on a Thursday, sometimes in a distressed state, and to be made welcome, be served a delicious lunch and leave with a bag full of vegetables, bakery and more, is truly rewarding for all concerned. We have a great volunteer team, and the skills people bring are utilised, appreciated and valued.”
Sustenance is hosting its official launch event on 4 November at the Kino-Teatr, St Leonards with an invitation-only screening of Longer Tables by Jake Bishop. This is a documentary that addresses food poverty in the UK and the work of Sustenance; it will subsequently be available on the free Water Bear channel.
The charity works with partners including Fareshare, Neighbourly, Tesco, Co-op, Sainsbury’s, M&S, Sussex Fruits and St Leonards Grocery, who provide surplus food on a weekly basis. It is run solely by volunteers and guided by dedicated and experienced trustees. Since 2021 it has:
handed out 6,088 full bags of shopping.
served 5,254 three-course nutritious meals.
saved nearly 51 tonnes of surplus food from landfill.
saved 142 tonnes of CO2 from going into the atmosphere.
