Redditch, UK: Oakland International is packing up to 20,000 boxes of food daily from its Leicestershire depot to deliver to Poland as part of its Ukrainian aid programme. Oakland previously financed and sent fifty trucks with aid to Ukraine.
Dean Attwell, chief executive, Oakland International, said: “We have over the last few weeks teamed up with the Ukrainian embassy, CBI, Accenture, Smurfit Kappa, Morrisons and a number of other key partners to trial a new initiative of food boxes which contains enough food for a week for our Ukraine friends who have either been displaced, stranded or who are on the frontline.
“Coupled with monies from the Ukrainian embassy to fund 500,000 additional food boxes, all packed and delivered by the end of May from our Bardon depot, we are delighted to have now received support from the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and the Mail Force appeal.”
The cost of assembling, packing and delivering the first 500,000 boxes has been shared between the Ukrainian embassy in London, and the Daily Mail’s Mail Force charity.
Food donations include those made by Spar UK and Bidfood, and over 260 pallets of public aid were collected in March via Oakland’s Redditch drop-off centre.
“Raising funds and filling boxes in the East Midlands for delivery to the Ukrainian border is one thing but it is the heroic drivers, truck and train crews delivering these boxes during the final stage of this extreme journey who are risking their lives to ensure that every bag of pasta and every tin of kidney beans ends up in the right place.
“This has been a massive team effort from all involved to make this happen. A huge thank you to our team members who are pulling out all the stops and our sincere thanks to Taras Krykun, the Deputy Ambassador of Ukraine to the UK, who has been a massive supporter of this initiative from the very outset.” Attwell said.
