On the eve of the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Disposal, the Social Pillar of the “SDGs for All” Platform implemented by the Ana and Vlade Divac Foundation in partnership with the Center for Democracy Foundation, organized a webinar “Food Donations – Needs and Challenges”, on September 27.
The aim of the webinar was to point out the readiness of Serbia to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal 2 – “A world Without Hunger”, with special emphasis on a Sub-Goal 2.2. – by the end of 2030 to end all forms of malnutrition, while achieving (by the end of 2025) internationally agreed goals related to retardation in the physical development of children under 5 years of age and focus on the nutritional needs of adolescents, pregnant women and nursing mothers, and the elderly.
The webinar also covered topics of the strategic framework and public policies to reduce hunger in Serbia, the availability of data to measure progress, and pointed to private, public and business sector initiatives aimed at providing food to the most vulnerable and reducing food waste.
As per the social inclusion and hunger reduction policies, Milica Stanković, Head of the Sector for Development of Social Protection Services and Cooperation with Associations from the Secretariat for Social Protection of the City of Belgrade, pointed out that all strategic documents adopted at the local and national level can contribute to the 2030 Agenda.
Jelena Radojicic, expert associate for social activities at the Red Cross of Serbia and Aleksandar Vidakovic, president, Federation of Food Banks of Serbia, spoke about the participation of civil, public and business sectors in combating hunger at the local level and available resources, needs and challenges.
Zeljko Mitkovski, project manager at the Ana and Vlade Divac Foundation, spoke on behalf of the Coalition for Charity, about associations and initiatives that contribute to increasing food donations for the most vulnerable and reducing food waste that is still safe for human consumption and called on everyone to get involved in the Save Food, Save the Charity Coalition initiative.
All panelists agreed that logistics involving food distribution is a great challenge in practice, but that the cooperation and coordination among the institutions and organizations such as food banks, civil society and public services greatly contribute to solving this problem.
You can find the presentation of Jelena Radojicic HERE.
Watch the video of the webinar HERE.