Partnership responsible for an average of 3.5 million school meals a year for children in Malawi
18 October 2012 at 17:15 CET – The Hague – On the Occasion of World Food Day, PostNL presented the 6th edition of the cookbook ‘Master Chefs for Home Chefs’ to Jeroen Roodenburg, ambassador of Business and Development Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He received the first copy from PostNL CEO, Herna Verhagen. With this book, PostNL is also commemorating its 10 year partnership with the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP). WFP provides food assistance to around 90 million people in 70 countries annually. Every sale of this cookbook provides a child in Malawi with forty school meals. Master Chefs for Home Chefs is a PostNL initiative and is entirely without personal gain. All proceeds will be donated to WFP.
Forty-six master chefs, including Jonnie Boer, Ron Blaauw, Ramon Beuk and Ronald Kunis, have selflessly supported the sixth edition of the cookbook ‘Master Chefs for Home Chefs’. Many other parties, including designers and photographers, have also cooperated without personal gain in the production and sale of the cookbook alongside the master chefs.
By providing knowledge, skills and resources, PostNL has supported the World Food Programme (WFP) since 2002. In recent years, many employees have provided support on site. In the Netherlands, they have organised campaigns to improve awareness for the problem of worldwide hunger and raised funds for school feeding programmes. This cooperation between PostNL and WFP has resulted in the extraordinary cookbook series ‘Master Chefs for Home Chefs’. The previous five editions of the cookbook provided around 10.48 million school meals for children in Malawi. Previous editions of this series have won the Gouden Garde Publieksprijs 2010 and the Gourmand World Cookbook Award 2011.
Herna Verhagen, CEO of PostNL: “Alongside our activities aimed at people and the environment, we also try to give substance to the concept of corporate social responsibility in other ways. Since 2004, we have been actively involved in the school feeding programme in Malawi and, as a partner of WFP in the fight against hunger, we have supported them with knowledge and experience for nearly 10 years.”
According to Jeroen Roodenburg, ambassador of Business and Development Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, this is an example of the power of Public-Private Cooperation: “PostNL and the World Food Programme are pioneers in Public-Private Cooperation within the UN in the fight against malnourishment. When it comes to Public-Private Cooperation in development, Dutch business is an international leader. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs supports this active role of business.”
About the World Food Programme
The World Food Programme (WFP) is the world’s largest humanitarian aid organisation aimed at fighting worldwide hunger. WFP is the branch of the United Nations that deals with food assistance and annually reaches about 90 million people in 70 countries. During emergencies, the WFP provides critical food assistance, often in the most remote areas. WFP subsequently helps local communities rebuild their livelihoods and improve their resistance against future disasters. Read more about the school feeding programme.
About PostNL
PostNL processes 8.7 billion addressed postal items (including 106 million parcels) each year and delivers to addresses in the Benelux, Germany, the UK and Italy. PostNL’s main business is mail, parcels and e-commerce. The company also provides services in the area of data and document management, direct marketing and fulfilment. PostNL employs some 65,500 people. In 2011 the company generated a turnover of nearly 4.3 billion euros.
