Since April 2012, the Love Centre of Elefsina supports 30 socially vulnerable families of the Municipality of Elefsina, by implementing a food aid programme of one-year duration, in cooperation with the John S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation and the Food Bank-Foundation to Fight Hunger. The aim of the programme is to improve the living conditions of 150 citizens of Elefsina, who face serious social and financial problems that have become worse as a result of the current financial crisis, by meeting their daily food needs.

This action is funded exclusively by the John S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation as part of the ‘It Is Our Duty’ emergency social solidarity programme, which it implements in cooperation with Non-Governmental Organisations, Local Government Organisations, Holy Metropolises, Parishes and institutional organisations that are active in the sector of social welfare and care.

The families that participate in the programme were selected by the administrative and scientific personnel of the Love Centre of Elefsina; the main selection criteria were poverty, unemployment, whether a family has many children or is a single-parent family, as well as health problems. The children of these families are among the 180 children aged 6 to 16 years old, who live in the Centre’s Friendly Nest, where psychosocial support is provided to them on a daily basis through a wide range of pedagogical and recreational programmes.

The food aid provided to the families consists of delivering, on a monthly basis, a total of 60 packages containing 27 food products with a long expiration date, such as oil, pasta, pulses, evaporated milk etc., and 10 additional fresh and frozen food products (meat, fish, vegetables, cheese) in order to cover, as fully as possible, their basic nutritional needs. In the framework of the food programme, the Food Bank –a public benefit non-profit foundation established in 1995 upon the initiative of Gerasimos Vasilopoulos in order to fight hunger and limit food waste– is responsible for ordering, packing and storing the food at its facilities, which is then delivered every month by the personnel of the Love Centre of Elefsina to the houses of the beneficiary families.

“The Love Centre of Elefsina supports the socially and financially vulnerable families of the Municipality of Elefsina and nearby regions since 1965. The John S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation, in cooperation with the Food Bank of Gerasimos Vasilopoulos, has embraced the efforts made by the Love Centre of Elefsina, by providing aid to the families that we support. It has secured their food needs for one year, thus demonstrating great sensitivity and discretion. It is such manifestations of love that give us the courage and strength to continue the work of the Archpriest of Elefsina, Father Georgios Pyrounakis”

said Mr Haralambos Pyrounakis, Chairman of the Love Centre of Elefsina regarding the food programme.