TWENTY-FIVE years after the foundation of the Salisbury Foodbank — a charitable venture that would evolve into the Trussell Trust (now simply Trussell) — foodbanks have become a staple in the UK. To start with, most were small, locally driven projects, often operating out of churches or community halls. Awareness was relatively low, and the work was unco-ordinated. The global financial crash of 2008 changed all that: the subsequent spike in unemployment and the rise in living costs meant a corresponding rise in the number of households unable to afford food, and, in response, foodbanks sprang up in cities, towns, and rural communities up and down the country. It wasn’t until 2023 that the UK Government first published official statistics on foodbank usage, at which point about three per cent of the UK’s population (approximately 2.3 million people, including six per cent of all children) lived in a household that had made use of a foodbank within the previous 12 months.

The most recent statistics from Trussell (a large, but not by any means the only, provider of foodbanks) suggest that emergency food provision across the UK remains high: close to three million parcels were distributed in 2024-25 — a figure that is two and a half times the level seen a decade ago. More than one million parcels help to feed children. The charity says that financial hardship, as a result of rising inflation and energy prices, has become the “new normal” in the UK.

Food pantries offer a different solution to the same problem. Where foodbanks are intended to provide short-term crisis relief — free emergency food parcels — pantries are set up to provide regular, low-cost food shopping for those in need. Many operate through membership schemes, into which individuals pay a small weekly fee to buy food at a discount. This gives users greater control over their food choices, and access to additional support services, such as cookery classes or budgeting advice. The scale of operation is relatively small: research by the UK group Your Local Pantry shows that they have supported 149,000 people since 2013. The model is empowering: the research suggests that pantries reach people in acute need, without stigma, and make it less likely that they will need help from a foodbank. Food pantries, the researchers conclude, “can and must” form part of a multi-layered strategy to eliminate hunger from the UK.

Few of us will have envied the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, tasked as she was this week with presenting a Budget amid haemorrhaging public support, a barrage of claims about Labour’s broken manifesto promises, and a fiscal hole of about £20 billion. She has acknowledged that so-called “ordinary families” suffer the impact of high prices most acutely. She has assured us that her 2025 Budget is designed to tackle the cost-of-living crisis. Next year’s figures for the use of foodbanks and food pantries will be one way of assessing the success — or otherwise — of the measures announced on Wednesday.