SOMERSET Park resident, Arkeev Gareeb, believes in meaningful change by transforming communities and renewing hope. The 38-year-old, who is the chairman of the KwaMashu branch of the Food For Life South Africa organisation which is a registered non-profit organisation. The NPO distributes approximately 15 000 plates of food per day to the poverty-stricken people of Durban and other cities across South Africa.
Gareeb, who is also involved in feeding programmes in Inanda and Mount Moriah, said there were still children going to school hungry.
“Two years ago I made a pledge that I would join the organisation and after my first feed, it just sort of snowballed from there. I saw the positive change that Food For Life made to the lives of the disadvantaged. At the moment we feed more than 700 children and people from old age homes weekly and we anticipate to grow this figure to 1 200 daily. We’ve also started a kitchen for the residents, which we hope to give a makeover to.
“You really get to see first-hand the effect and impact feeding the poor can have on the community. We are looking for anyone who can help us renovate our temporary kitchen and we help through sponsorships or giving their time to help,” he said.
He added the organisation was non-sectarian and non-discriminating with volunteers from different religious and racial backgrounds involved in feeding programmes.
“There is so much joy and happiness from the people we are helping. The most humbling aspect of giving back to the community was when one of the elderly members came forward and offered us a traditional Zulu blessing thanking us for the help. What I hope is to see more people volunteer their time and to create more awareness of the organisation. I’d like to encourage residents to get involved to contact me on arkeev.gareeb@fflsa.org or visit www.fflsa.org.
- ON 13 December, Food For Life is hosting a cooking event, “A Pot for Poverty”, which will help feed 8 000 children on the day. Patrons willing to assist will be given the opportunity to cook the pot and distribute the prepared meal to a charity of their choice. Each pot feeds 250 plates and the cost of each pot is R850. All ingredients and cooking items will be provided on the day of the feed.
