Food collection 2024, here’s what to buy to help those in difficulty: one in ten Italians is in absolute poverty

National Day of Food Collection returns on Saturday 16 November 2024, in over 11,600 Italian supermarkets with 150,000 volunteers in orange bib from the Food Bank. The solidarity initiative is promoted by the Food Bank Foundation and carried out under the High Patronage of the President of the Republic. This is the cardinal’s appeal Matteo Maria Zuppi, Archbishop of Bologna and President of the Italian Episcopal Conference: «The Food Bank has involved us for many years and created opportunities for sharing. In reality, what is asked of us is a small gesture, which becomes big because it is a gesture of solidarity and attention. It’s important just to know that someone has thought of me and that my difficult situation has been taken care of.”

Where and what to buy

In more than 11,600 supermarkets throughout Italy, over 150,000 Food Bank volunteers, recognizable by their orange bib, will invite you to purchase long-life products such as oil, canned vegetables or legumes, tomato pulp or puree, canned tuna or meat and baby food.

All donated food will then be distributed to more 7,600 local partner organizations affiliated with the Food Bank (soup kitchens, family homes, communities for minors, listening centres, street units, etc.) which support approximately 1,790,000 people.

Poverty in Italy: record data

According to the Caritas report 2024 just presented, 9.7% of the population lives in a condition of absolute poverty. That’s one in ten people. There are 5 million 694 thousand absolute poor, in total over 2 million 217 thousand families. the data, in relation to 2022, show a slight increase in poverty on a family basis. From 2014 to today, the growth in poverty has been almost uninterrupted. The incidence of absolute poverty among minors is increasingly higher: it is 13.8%. There are one million 295 thousand poor children.

• Here is the complete Caritas 2024 report
• Infographics from the report on poverty in Italy: fact_sheet_poverty_report.pdf(application/pdf 9.26MB)

Poverty is also growing among those who have a job: 8% of employed people are poor. Poor and intermittent work is rampant, with low wages and atypical contracts that prevent a dignified life. Young people and families with children are the most vulnerable groups. Housing hardship represents an emergency, with families without homes or in inadequate housing conditions. Access to education and new technologies becomes a mirage for increasingly larger segments of the population, fueling inequalities.

The people accompanied by Caritas services in 2023 were 269,689. From 2015 to today their number has grown by 41.6%. Chronic and intermittent poverty increases: from 54.7% to 59%. Psychological and psychiatric distress is growing among those who turn to Caritas: from 2022 to 2023 the number of people suffering from depression or mental illnesses increases by 15.2%.