Rick Chee founded Food Aid Foundation in 2013 with a mission to rescue surplus foods across the supply chain and distribute them to those in need.
Since its inception, the group has rescued about RM34 million worth of food annually.
For their noble efforts, Food Aid Foundation is one of the winners of the Star Golden Hearts Award (SGHA) 2024.
SGHA is an annual award by The Star that honours everyday Malaysian unsung heroes.
For more, visit sgha.com.my
WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news
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Since its inception, the group has rescued about RM34 million worth of food annually.
For their noble efforts, Food Aid Foundation is one of the winners of the Star Golden Hearts Award (SGHA) 2024.
SGHA is an annual award by The Star that honours everyday Malaysian unsung heroes.
For more, visit sgha.com.my
WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news
SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar
LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline
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NewsTranscript
00:00Our mission here is to rescue and recover surplus food from all types of food service
00:15establishment, from hotel, restaurant, hypermarket to manufacturer, and ensuring that it's safe
00:22before we get it connected to our beneficiary, the underprivileged, the poor and the hungry.
00:30Hi, I'm Rick Chee. We are from Food Aid Foundation and we are the winner of the STAR Golden Hearts
00:39Award 2024. We started in 2013 and we are almost 11 years in operation and until today we have
00:56branches and partners throughout the country to reach out to the underprivileged because I find
01:02it quite unfair where the major donors from food manufacturers or financial donors are very much
01:08concentrated in the cities and the small towns, the villages are deprived of this assistance.
01:17Our activities is basically a daily affair 24-7 because of our schedule, the donation,
01:28our contract with hypermarket where we have to pick up the food and to service our beneficiary
01:35throughout the Klang Valley from refugees to welfare shelter homes to the urban poor.
01:42And we also schedule to collect to rescue fresh vegetables, those unsold from central
01:48market to get it connected to the urban poor as well as the shelter home.
02:03There are two parts of the food that we rescue, those that comes in raw and those that are dry
02:09essential products. Essential products are distributed as part of our fresh ration or
02:14raw material but however in times of crisis we have our commercial hot kitchen where we cook
02:22hot food to serve the victims of disasters such as floods or even COVID-19. Above that,
02:30on regular basis we cook hot meals to work with the government agency which is the DBKL
02:38where we send our food to this centre for the homeless.
02:48When we started like any organisation, we start with a trust deficit so over the year
02:55we build on accountability, transparency to earn the respect from this organisation
03:01and I'm proud to say on a yearly basis we have rescued 34 million worth of free food
03:08from all this organisation which is our strong supporter today.
03:22We received 9,500 cartons of our Oreo from Mondelez that is two weeks ago.
03:28Most of the stock has been distributed to Malacca, to Penang, to Johor, to Kota Bharu
03:36and to Ipoh as well. So we share with our partners which is all around in Malaysia
03:41including we have our own Food Aid Ipoh, Food Aid Malacca and then Food Aid Kelantan.
03:49As you can see this is one of our freezer, this is freezer one,
03:53this is basically what we received is actually a bread from High Stand and then ice cream from
04:00Imarayu. So from High Stand they have been supporting us since day one for the past nine
04:05years. We collect on a weekly basis between 80 to 120 cartons of bread.
04:11These are some of the fish head that we actually rescued from a restaurant
04:16from a chef in Kota Kamuning Golf Club.
04:26We have created branches and partners throughout the country
04:30where abundance of food that reach all over the world,
04:34We have created branches and partners throughout the country
04:38where abundance of food that reach us even by container, we actually get it shared with
04:45different partners throughout the state by sending to them and our branches and
04:49partner will copy our same model to rescue food from the locals in their area.
04:55We have a commercial kitchen here with an intention to provide hot food to the poor
05:02community as well as some cyclic menu for the urban poor which typically their menu
05:08are very much gravy laden with minimum nutrition or protein. That's one of our objective and this
05:14kitchen is also for us to do a lot of food delivery.
05:24We have a mini laboratory for us to test E.coli bacteria making sure it's safe before we
05:36pack this food to our beneficiary and also this kitchen are all detachable for emergency especially
05:44disaster where we can mobilize this commercial kitchen on the ground to provide hot food not
05:50only to the victims but also volunteers on the ground.
05:55Time is an essence in our operation because a good 90 percent of the food that we rescue
06:04are close to expiration some as far as nine months and some just two days left.
06:12So it's very critical for us but we have structured in a sense that those shelter
06:18homes who have vehicle they will come and pick up the ration here for us to push out
06:24those delimited left two or three days to get out the first batch of the food out leaving
06:29a small option to play with those with longer dead that's our motto.
06:46Well I spent the last 40 years in the corporate world and embarking on charitable work I find it
06:52very fulfilling because our work consists of providing food to the underprivileged and a
06:59plate of food landing in front of them you can actually experience instant gratitude
07:04that motivate us to do more.
07:07Happy 10th anniversary to the Star Golden Hearts Award. We are truly honored to be receiving this
07:15award and we hope you will continue your effort and initiative and your initiative truly inspire
07:23and motivate us to continue to do more. Once again happy birthday and thank you.