Generous shoppers have demonstrated goodwill by donating food to the needy as part of the Help Feed People In Need project between a Bradford foodbank and Tesco.

Shoppers heading to the Peel Centre Tesco in Canal Road last weekend were urged to donate some goods to the Trussell Trust foodbank, who give out food to those in dire need from their base at the Light Church on Jermyn Street.

A ton-and-a-half of food, enough to feed families for a month, was collected, and £700 was donated by Tesco.

The project came after it was revealed that more than one in ten people in Yorkshire and the Humber have skipped meals or gone without food to feed their family in the last year.

Food bank volunteer Ben Haldane said that the event last Saturday and Sunday had been a success.

He said: “This food will help us continue for a month and we will add it to our other collections. It has put us in a very good position to help more and more people as the need arises and we would like to thank the staff for helping us.”

The success comes as nationally it was revealed that families were walking up to 20 miles to get food bank handouts, but Mr Haldane said that there was no evidence of this in Bradford.

The Bradford Metropolitan Food Bank, a separate organisation to the Trussell Trust, which gives food parcels to organisations to be handed out to those in need, was set up specifically to reach people in outlying areas.

That food bank was set up eight years ago by Bradford man Lashman Singh who is now urging volunteers to contact them and help pack food. They gave out 400 food parcels last month and expect that figure to rise as people struggle to pay bills after Christmas. Volunteers have worked two nights this week packing 80 bags at a time.

Mr Singh said: “We created it so geographically we could reach a wider audience and have never had that situation where people travel that far for food. We never see the recipients and have no contact with them whatsoever.

“It is good for me that we are able to help people in need. It isn’t just us, we are just the custodians of food and a cog in the wheel.

“I don’t know the reasons behind people travelling that far elsewhere and if we can help them, we will.

“We are now appealing for volunteer’s applications to come and help us and those out at Christmas parties or buying Christmas cards could maybe think of donating a tin or two to the Food Bank.”

For more information visit bradfordfoodbank.com.