New figures released this week show the Auckland City Mission faced the greatest ever demand for its emergency food parcels last year.
It distributed more than 21,000 food parcels in 2018 - that is a 55% more than the previous year.
Mission Social Services General Manager Helen Robinson says these figures show a dramatic increase in the demand for food. It's also evidence that there is a hunger crisis now present in our country.
The Mission distributed 8,242 food parcels in December – providing more than 300 thousand individual meals in that time. That also represented a big jump in demand. In December 2017 the Mission gave out 4,680 food parcels.
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Auckland City Mission's annual Chrismas lunch 2018.
Robinson says a huge amount of generosity was shown, with the Christmas appeal raising $1,641,701.03. Not only did this help bring joy to whānau in need over the festive season, but it also helped the Mission support whānau as they prepared to send their children back to school.
“Christmas is a real time of need for many people. We know too, this time of year is a difficult one for families as children return to school. For families on inadequate incomes this means often, there is not enough money left over for food."
We are very grateful for the support of the Auckland community to our appeal, and want to say thank you – your support means we can respond to the very real and desperate needs of thousands of Aucklanders, something we see each day at the Mission,” Robinson says.