Marcus Rashford’s work with FareShare

Why Marcus chose to support FareShare

England International footballer Marcus Rashford has been an ambassador of FareShare since March 2020.

At the start of the coronavirus outbreak, and planning for the consequences of the pandemic on vulnerable communities, FareShare launched an urgent Covid-19 appeal calling for donations, food and volunteers. FareShare was preparing for an unprecedented crisis, and expectations soon became reality with demand for food almost doubling within one month of the lockdown.

Marcus Rashford soon heard FareShare’s call for support. FareShare’s work fighting hunger in the nation’s most vulnerable communities, especially our ActiveAte campaign helping vulnerable children at risk of hunger over the summer holidays, is aligned to Marcus’ personal mission. His own family relied on breakfast clubs, free school meals and at times, food banks. Raised by mum Melanie Maynard, who worked full time earning minimum wage, it was often not enough. As Marcus explains: “the system was not built for families like mine to succeed, regardless of how hard my mum worked.”

All too aware of just how vulnerable millions of families were to falling into hardship – and how the crisis and imminent school closures could exacerbate the issue – the England and Manchester United player acted quickly. Marcus partnered with FareShare and made several significant financial donations to help ensure vulnerable children could continue to access food from FareShare, calling on his millions of followers to donate and support too.

Marcus’ support of FareShare has been transformational. Since March 2020, Marcus has:

• Helped raise enough money to enable FareShare to distribute the equivalent of over 21 million meals for children and families who might not otherwise eat
• Raised awareness of child hunger in the UK, driving the issue to the top of the news agenda
• Launched and spearheaded the Child Food Poverty Taskforce, a group of more than 15 organisations that FareShare is a founding member of, which have come together to support the National Food Strategy and share real-time statistics and stories of those affected by child hunger in the UK
• Successfully influenced government policy:
  • With his #MakeTheUTurn campaign, which saw the voucher scheme – a replacement for free school meals through the lockdown – extended over the summer, ensuring 1.3 million vulnerable children could continue to access food
  • In November, after campaigning by the Child Food Poverty Taskforce, Government announced a Winter Package to support the UK’s most vulnerable children through the winter until Easter 2021.

To help support families most in need across the UK, the Child Food Poverty Taskforce has now launched www.endchildfoodpoverty.org – an online resource where people can find support, or find out how to help charities, in their local area.

This Christmas, thanks to support from Marcus, Sir Alex Ferguson and Sir Michael Moritz have joined FareShare’s fight to tackle hunger in the most vulnerable communities by matching donations to FareShare’s Christmas appeal. To double your impact, please donate here.

Marcus and FareShare have come together to help tackle childhood hunger in the UK, and we are very grateful for his support.