Council to dish up food poverty pilot scheme in Ballymena South

BALLYMENA councillors have been shocked to hear the grim extent of food poverty in some of the most ‘deprived’ parts of the town.

It was revealed during a presentation on a Food Poverty Pilot project to Council’s Community Planning and Wellbeing Committee that some people didn’t even own the basic cooking utensils necessary to cook a homemade meal such as saucepans.

One person, a woman in her 20s, “didn’t know what fruit and veg were”, Senior Environmental Health Officer, Mrs Juliet Coulter told the meeting.

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Mrs Coulter was addressing the committee on a ‘unique health and wellbeing partnership project’ led by Council’s Environmental Health Department aimed at tackling food poverty in the south of the town before rolling it out to other deprived parts of the borough in the summer.

Food Poverty is defined as ‘the inability to access a nutritionally adequate diet and related impacts on health, culture and social participation’ and the meeting heard that “with food prices set to rise, a well-balanced diet will become a luxury for many”.

Mrs Coulter revealed that the Environmental Health Department (EHD) has successfully secured ‘significant funding’ from the Public Health Agency to pilot a unique project to address the issue of Food Poverty in the borough.

This will involve working with young families who are experiencing food poverty to equip them with the knowledge and skills to help them buy healthier foods at a reasonable cost, budget better to afford healthier foods, increase their understanding of nutrition and food labelling, and improve their basic cooking skills to enable them to prepare their own wholesome meals.

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Delivered by EDH staff in partnership with local government agencies and local businesses, the project will target the most deprived electoral wards in the borough, starting with Ballymena South.

Focussing on small groups of up to eight-10 at a time, a programme of events will be organised comprising a number of short sessions for families with young children to attend and a one-day community event.

In response to a query from Alderman James Henry about the selection of people for the programme, Mrs Coulter said that the EDH were working to identify participants with the support of SureStart.

Councillors were told: “Whilst officer time spend for such projects are considerable, the benefits of such initiatives cannot be underestimated in relation to the positive impact this project should have on vulnerable households within our community”.

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Mrs Coulter also told the committee: “This is not the sort of thing that is going to be sorted with a quick fix” and went on to illustrate the point by revealing that some local people did not even possess saucepans to cook with or freezers to enable them to save money on food through bulk purchases.

Cllr Jayne Dunlop said: “Part of me thinks ‘this can’t be true’ but it is and we need to be doing something about it”.

Cllr Monica Digney said: “It’s a sad sign of the times. I know young people that have no clue about cooking - it’s about re-educating”.

Deputy Mayor, Cllr Beth Adger commented: “Lazy-itis springs to mind! It’s downright ridiculous that young people are growing up in this day and age and don’t know how to cook.

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Parents should hold their heads in shame because it’s the parents who haven’t taught their kids how to cook.”

Alderman Sam Hanna described it as “most depressing” that someone didn’t know what a vegetable was.

Cllrs James Currie, Timothy Gaston and Audrey Wales were united in the opinion that such lessons for life as household budgeting and cooking needed to be taught from a young age at school while Cllr Robin Cherry voiced himself in favour of involving young people more in ‘growing their own’ produce for the table.

Councillor Martin Clarke added: “It’s hard to believe this is Ballymena in 2013”.

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The committee went on to agree the recommendation before them that they noted the proactive work of EHD staff in recognising the needs of the local community in relation to food poverty, sourcing funding, engaging partners and also devising and leading an evidence based, innovative pilot project.

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