In a burst of citizen solidarity, the Food Bank has received tons of food for families affected by DANA in Valencia. Many. So many in fact, that part of those bricks of milk, cans of preserves or boxes of cookies will never reach the Valencian Community. A part will stay, for example, in Valladolid. Maybe it sounds strange. It may seem anecdotal. The fact is that what happened in the capital of Pucelana is a clear reflection of the best and worst of the solidarity network that has been activated in the face of the catastrophe that has devastated Valencia.
It reminds us that solidarity is a muscle of tremendous strength… And how difficult it can be to harness that strength.
What happened in Valladolid? Nothing that was not foreseeable. And human. After seeing the images of the floods in Valencia, basements and parking lots flooded with mud, destroyed homes and people mourning their dead or searching for missing people, in Valladolid – like many other parts of Spain – the muscle of solidarity was activated: people took food from their refrigerators and cupboards or bought it in supermarkets in the hope that these foods would alleviate the hardships of one of the families in Paiporta or Aldaia.
It was logical, right? After all, when we have seen environmental catastrophes in other distant places, such as the earthquakes in Haiti or Morocco or the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, that is what those affected needed: the most basic things, food and clothing. After this flood of solidarity and taking into account that the situation in the Valencian Community is still very far from having normalized, on Saturday The North of Castile published an article with a shocking headline: “Tons of food donated to DANA will be distributed in Valladolid to prevent them from expiring.”
Click on the image to go to the tweet.
Why’s that? For something no less predictable: in Valladolid, like in any other city in Spain or the rest of the planet, families donate based on their criteria and experience. They deliver bricks of milk, packets of cookies or rice, cans… And this avalanche of solidarity does not always adjust to the real needs in the affected area or allow us to act efficiently, especially if we are talking about perishable food.
The Castilian-Leon newspaper speaks, for example, that in the warehouse of the La Cistérniga Food Bank they have collected cans of milk that will spoil in a few weeks or (at least) have already expired. And not the only ones. Part of the donations given to Valencians are foods that leave little room for maneuver and run the risk of spoiling, such as yogurt, bread, cold cuts… Products that they have not been able to put on trucks to Valencia because there were other priorities, such as cleaning materials .
Solidarity bankrupt? Not at all. First, because none of them are. Second, because the organization itself has already looked for a way to take advantage of this wave of solidarity, even if it is with a longer detour than expected. The idea of the Food Bank is to also take advantage of this material. As? In the case of Valladolid, for example, distribute perishable food among the people it usually serves in the area, around 12,000.
Some of that food has already begun to arrive at its warehouse in Argales and will end up in homes and solidarity organizations in Pucelana. That does not mean that the gesture of their donors will not benefit those affected by DANA in Valencia. The Food Bank will deliver 1.8 euros for each of those ‘diverted’ kilos for the victims of the Valencia tragedy. From the Valladolid delegation they clarify that the money will go to the State Federation of Food Banks to transfer it to their colleagues located in Valencia or Albacete.
Click on the image to go to the tweet.
An isolated case? No. It takes a Google search to see that the Food Bank has been “overwhelmed” in other parts of Spain, such as Córdoba or Cádiz. From these regions, or others, such as Galicia or Valladolid itself, the same message has also been insisted on: the importance of the solidarity response being coordinated, precisely in order to gain effectiveness.
“Let’s not donate to Valencia like headless chickens, they are overwhelmed with all the food shipment they have,” he explained to The Voice of Galicia a few days ago José Luis Doval, spokesperson for the solidarity organization in Pontevedra. There and in Vigo, the bank decided to act as a food depository in an attempt to organize and distribute the flow of food to Valencia, adjusting to the needs and capacity to assume the donations. “Otherwise the food will end up in a state of decomposition.”
Food or money? Another of the keys of recent weeks and that once again highlights the decision that has now been made in Valladolid: Better donations of food, clothing and cleaning products or money transfers, cash that leaves more room for organizations to coordinate their responses? In Córdoba, the mayor himself, José María Bellido, even asked his followers to “prioritize” financial aid instead of material aid after the town’s firefighters collected more than 160 tons of products that were headed to Valencia.
“For us it is a satisfaction to see society’s response to a misfortune like this. But it is a very poorly designed collection campaign. You cannot order food and cleaning supplies from all of Spain to serve 100,000 people,” agreed Juan José. Cas, vice president of the Córdoba Food Bank, in statements to El Diario de Córdoba. His warehouse in Campo San Antón was already packed with boxes with different products, from food to water, diapers or brooms, more than a week ago.
Click on the image to go to the tweet.
Why is it a challenge? Among other issues, due to logistics. From Cádiz the message was clear. “We greatly appreciate the collaboration, but we are overwhelmed. Please, any collection of food and essential items must be coordinated with the Food Bank first.” There they directly claimed to have run out of pallets, boxes and storage space. “And the warehouses we have in Valencia are also full right now,” the organization explained to Cadiz Newspaper in early November, days after DANA.
The truth is that (fortunately) Spain is not used to dealing with disasters like the one that hit Valencia, but the organizations and professionals who work on social networks are and from very early on there were voices that insisted on the importance of coordinating the response. . On November 4, Directo al Paladar spoke with experts who questioned whether “the call for ‘operation kilo'” was the appropriate response for Valencia.
“It is an increasingly archaic model. Now what is usually requested is cash,” explained one aid worker: “People do not realize the enormous cost that all this logistics entails.” As an example, he explained that a donation of ten euros in food can entail distribution costs that represent half or even the full value of what has been given.
What exactly does it tell us? The boom in solidarity unleashed by the Valencia tragedy leaves a few ideas on the table. Some positive. Others, not so much. Among the first, there is a key: in emergency situations, people respond, mobilize and look for a way to help. And they usually do so by resorting to previous experiences or recent references that, in the case of environmental catastrophes, have occurred far from Spain.
Among the second ideas, the not so positive one, the lack of a better organized response that would coordinate and organize solidarity in the early stages stands out above all. Especially by public institutions. At the end of the day, it is foreseeable that help will continue to be needed in Valencia in the coming months, not just immediately after DANA.
Anything else? “It strikes me that in a context like Spain it has to come to this. It’s not useful. When it comes to food, the shelf life is very short, are they going to be able to cook it?” the international aid worker explained to DAP after pointing out the challenge (and costs) involved in managing food deliveries.
She is not the only one to point in that direction. The Córdoba Food Bank recognized days ago that the collection campaign was “very poorly designed.” “We ask the people of Córdoba to please make only financial contributions,” they point out. The Diario de Córdoba at the Medina Azahara Food Bank.
Why do we donate in kind? That the response has been so intense in the delivery of food, medicine or clothing, merchandise after all, raises another question: Are we more reticent to collaborate with financial contributions, even if they are for the same amount that we have dedicated for For example, filling a bag in the supermarket that we will then deliver to an NGO? Have the cases of attempted fraud, some of which are very high-profile and media-friendly, harmed this means of solidarity?
The question is not trivial if we take into account that charitable organizations are beginning to question the efficiency, at least in certain cases, of direct aid in kind.
Image | Valladolid City Council (X)
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