The Tasmanian Liberal Government is a big supporter of volunteer groups and organisations, like Foodbank Tasmania, that help build stronger local communities.
Foodbank facilitates the supply of surplus food to the community, providing for thousands of meals every day, and breakfast programs for 106 Tasmanian schools, via an army of 3,700 volunteers.
Today we welcome the opening of the new Foodbank Tasmania hub in Devonport, which will greatly improve distribution in North-West and Northern Tasmania.
The Tasmanian Liberal Government provides annual funding of $200,000 a year to Foodbank Tasmania, and we are providing a further $400,000 over 4 years to help them develop a more efficient state-wide food relief distribution network in the North-West to complement its warehouse in Hobart.
The opening of the Foodbank hub in Devonport coincides with a television advertising campaign, a major promotion in Woolworths stores state-wide, and Zambrero restaurants in Tasmania, producing 30,000 meals for Foodbank for distribution.
In 2015/16 Foodbank Tasmania collected a total of 1.376 million kilograms of food from donor organisations which equated to more than 2.5 million meals.
The Tasmanian Government congratulates the Foodbank Tasmania staff, volunteers and board for their dedication and commitment to helping Tasmanians in need, which the Tasmanian Government is proud to support.