Cargill, Rizq join forces to combat food insecurity in Pakistan

The RizqBank will offer four key services to help eradicate food insecurity

Cargill and Rizq have come together with the shared goal of ending hunger across Pakistan by setting up a food bank network. A groundbreaking ceremony was held on January 13, 2021 for the first-ever Cargill RizqBank, in Lyari, Karachi – one of the largest food insecure communities in Pakistan. The Rizq Cargill ecosystem will work to create a food secure Lyari, reduce food wastage and will be able to serve about 200,000 meals in the community, annually.

The RizqBank will offer four key services to help eradicate food insecurity and end hunger in slum communities across the country. This includes RizqDaig, distribution of food within the community, RizqRation, identifying and delivering monthly food supplies to food insecure families and establishing a community center, RizqBachao, collecting, storing and distributing excess food to low-income families and Rizq Future Generation Program, mobilizing youth from schools and universities to support activities of zero waste and zero hunger.

In phase two, the program will progress towards setting up the RizqXchange, a collaborative initiative to mobilize resources through a network of RizqBanks. The Rizq Xchange is enabled by ShareRizq platform, cloud-foodbanking technology that connects people who want to donate food, with distributors that are giving food to beneficiaries in real-time.

Advancing its corporate purpose of nourishing communities in a safe, responsible and sustainable way, Cargill has contributed seed funding and will assist Rizq with technical advisory services to efficiently create and run the food bank operations. Cargill employees will also engage as volunteers at the Cargill RizqBank. Rizq will manage the on-ground deployment and operations of this innovative model.