A BRADFORD charity has teamed up with a supermarket giant to help provide healthy meals for some of the most vulnerable people across the district.

The Bridge Project, based in Salem Street in the city centre, helps people with multiple needs, including those affected by drug and alcohol misuse, mental health conditions, and housing and offending issues.

It has now joined forces with Bradford-based Morrisons for a project aimed at preventing food waste and feeding those in need.

Alongside the West Yorkshire Finding Independence (WYFI) service, a Big Lottery-funded initiative, the Bridge Project is now receiving regular donations of fresh and perishable foods that would previously have been discarded and thrown away.

The supermarket began donating items such as tinned goods around a year ago, but the parties are now working together in a new approach to tackle food waste.

Once the donations arrive, volunteers at the Bridge’s social enterprise, Forks Cafe in North Parade, turn the unwanted ingredients into a range of meals that are stored and kept ready for distribution.

Staff outreach teams from the Bridge and WYFI then deliver the hot, nutritious meals to homeless and vulnerable clients across the city.

The team said that it was currently providing more than 180 meals a week to people in need.

A spokesman for Bridge said: “This is food that has gone from being thrown in the bin to providing really healthy meals to people who need that support.

“It is all put together by volunteers giving their time back in our cafe, and it really is a big win for everyone involved.”

Tracey Hogan, the Bridge’s director of operations, said: “We are delighted with the partnership with Morrisons, who have helped us provide healthy meals to people who are in really difficult circumstances.

“It shows what can be done when organisations from across the community come together to find better ways of working.”

Morrisons said its work with the Bridge Project was part of the company’s wider unsold-food-to-charity programme.

A spokesman said: “The Bridge currently collects unsold food donations from our Morrisons Thornbury store.

“We have more than 420 stores connected with various local community groups across the UK like the Bridge, and in the first year of the programme we’ve donated more than two million products.”

MORE TOP STORIES