The aim of the Money and Pension Service (MaPS) is to help people – particularly those most in need – to improve their financial wellbeing and build a better, more confident future. Working collaboratively across the UK, we make sure customers can access high-quality money and pensions guidance and debt advice throughout their lives, how and when they need it.

Feeding Gloucestershire recently hosted a workshop to introduce organisations across the county to the services offered by MaPS. A recording of the workshop can be found on our YouTube channel

MaPS offer a range of help leaflets including –

Help with the Cost of Living

Making the Most of your Money Guide

Credit Unions and Alternatives to High Cost Credit

Money Advisor Network – Accessing free, regulated Debt Advice

Your Pension, Your Choices

For more information visit their website

The Trussell Trust supports a nationwide network of food banks that provide emergency food and support to people locked in poverty, and campaign for change to end the need for food banks in the UK.

The Trussell Trust have been part of the journey of Feeding Gloucestershire since 2021, with Phil Coysh, Area Manager for the Trussell Trust for Gloucestershire, Bristol and North Somerset, sitting on our Network Board.

In 2022 Feeding Gloucestershire worked alongside Phil to bring the Independent Food Aid Network’s ‘Worrying About Money?’ cash first referral leaflets to Gloucestershire, with the roll out of the leaflet in Stroud and the Cotswolds, and now our project coordinator is coordinating the work to roll out the leaflets in Gloucester, Cheltenham, Tewkesbury, and the Forest of Dean, this work will be completed in spring 2023

Through our connection with The Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group SW, Feeding Gloucestershire has linked to The GREAT Project. Through the link with the GREAT project we aim to connect community growing projects across the county to support and to knowledge of environmentally friendly growing methods.

The GREAT Project is putting Gloucestershire in the vanguard of the transition to regenerative agriculture.

GREAT stands for Gloucestershire Regenerative Environment and Agriculture Transition. It’s a three-year project, funded by Thirty Percy, to boost the transition to farming methods that restore the soil, water and air. We want to join the dots between farmers, advisors, growers, mentors and their communities to facilitate this change that is so sorely needed for a resilient future for farms, nature and the earth.

We have three core aims: build evidence, facilitate knowledge exchange, and nurture enterprise.

The Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group South West  (FWAGSW) have worked with Feeding Gloucestershire since September 2021. FWAG SW currently administer Feeding Gloucestershire’s funding and are part of our Network Board connecting us to farming and conservation work happening in our county and nationally.

FWAG SW also host the Sustainable Food Places coordinator, and work closely with the Gloucestershire Food and Farming partnership and Feeding Gloucestershire to support the County’s membership of this national program and the development of the county’s campaign for the bronze award

FWAG SW is a registered charity representing the region’s farmers and landowners in the delivery of wildlife conservation.

FWAG was first established as a charity in the 1960s by a group of forward thinking farmers who saw that the environment was an important part of a successful farming business. FWAG SW shares this vision today and acts to promote and enhance the conservation of wildlife, the environment and the landscape in relation to modern agricultural needs

FWAG SW provide independent advice and deliver real change on farmland by working with land managers and landowners across the region. Combining an understanding of farming systems, land management and farm businesses with habitat creation, habitat management and species conservation, FWAG SW is able to effect positive environmental change in the wider landscape.

We also focus on helping farm businesses manage their natural capital assets like soil, water and carbon. FWAG SW specialises in making government policy, environmental incentives, regulations and emerging environmental markets accessible for farmers and land managers at a practical delivery level.

The Forest Voluntary Action Forum have supported and worked with Feeding Gloucestershire since 2021. They have provided valuable insight into the work happening in the Forest of Dean and Nick Penny has sat on the Network Board of Feeding Gloucestershire bringing insight and experience from his work in the communities of the Forest of Dean to help ensure the Vision, Mission and Aims of Feeding Gloucestershire are reflective of the work needed at grassroots level.

FVAF are the Voluntary Service Council and Volunteer Centre for the Forest of Dean. Providing assistance to many of the hundreds of voluntary and community organisations in the District who are in turn better able to deliver their work in and for the local community.

Since forming in 1994 they have developed a reputation for encouraging, embracing and enhancing community action throughout the Forest of Dean. They believe that through community-led approaches we enable citizens to develop the skills, resiliency and social capital to live happier, better connected lives.

Feeding Gloucestershire has been working with the Independent Food Aid Network to roll out 'Worrying About Money' support leaflets across the districts of Gloucestershire

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is an award-winning charity with a vision of a UK where no one goes hungry. We support a national network of 50 regional anti-hunger partnerships comprising more than 600 local organisations – ranging from community centres and schools, to local authorities and social enterprises.
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Feeding Britain supported the formation of Feeding Gloucestershire and continues to offer support to our network, connecting us to a national network where we have the opportunity to share knowledge, ideas and potential solutions to issues. Through Feeding Britain we can share the stories from our communities at a national level
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Feeding Britain relies on its network of regional partners to provide evidence and knowledge of what is happening in communities across the country to fuel the work of creating systemic change to alleviate and eliminate hunger

Plan to transform Gloucestershire’s Food Culture Wins National Recognition

Gloucestershire Food & Farming Partnership (GFFP), supported by Feeding Gloucestershire (FG), have achieved membership of the Sustainable Food Places network to support their efforts to make local, healthy and sustainable food available to all.

In Sept 2022 the new SFP coordinator came into post, working with the GFFP, FG, and FWAG SW (Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group) to collectively coordinate Gloucestershire’s food and farming landscape, with the aim of moving the county towards achieving a Sustainable Food Places Bronze Award.

“I’m really looking forward to helping connect food and farming across Gloucestershire with the Sustainable Food Places Network. I have met so many inspirational people and projects already and am keen to connect with even more – look out for a Sustainable Food Places Bronze Award Campaign in the near future, and please send me any news of projects or groups which could be included in our programme.”
Jenny Salter – Gloucestershire SFP Coordinator ([email protected])

Sustainable Food Places is a network of cross-sector partnerships in towns, cities, boroughs and counties that are using food as a vehicle to drive positive change. With support from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation and The National Lottery Community Fund, the Network helps people and places to share challenges, explore practical solutions and develop best practice in all aspects of healthy and sustainable food.

Gloucestershire joins a network of over 70 members across the UK who work to tackle some of the biggest social, economic and environmental issues today, from an epidemic of food poverty and diet related ill-health to the loss of independent high street food businesses and family farms through to climate change, biodiversity loss and food waste.

The Sustainable Food Places programme work across six key areas:
1. Promoting healthy and sustainable food to the public
2. Tackling food poverty, diet-related ill health and access to affordable healthy food 16
3. Building community food knowledge, skills, resources and projects
4. Promoting a vibrant and diverse sustainable food economy
5. Transforming catering and food procurement
6. Reducing waste and the ecological footprint of the food system

For more information about Sustainable Food Places visit www.sustainablefoodplaces.org and follow our Twitter: @FoodPlacesUK

In 2023  Jenny, with the support of  Gloucestershire Food and Farming Partnership ,Feeding Gloucestershire , FWAG and Gloucestershire County Council launched a county-wide program of work  to secure Gloucestershire its Sustainable Food Places Bronze Award. 

In November 2023 Gloucestershire received a bronze award.

Are a collaborative partner network formed by harnessing the voices, passion and expertise of institutions, organisations, businesses, groups and communities across the region to build and champion a sustainable food and farming future for the county of Gloucestershire.
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During early 2021 Feeding Gloucestershire was working in parallel with GFFP, but are now discussing working in partnership to deliver strands of the GFFP work.
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Feeding Gloucestershire has also facilitated connections to support the GFFP’s organisational conversation program. These organisational conversations have given a picture of the variety of work happening across the county that has a focus on food – including food hubs, food pantries and food banks, community projects, community growing schemes, community orchards and community allotments.

The conversations have highlighted how essential the community and voluntary sector are in providing support to communities across our county and the need to connect and support this work.

Emergent theme’s from these conversations have served to direct Feeding Gloucestershire’s membership offer.
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Gloucestershire Food and Farming Partnership https://www.gloucestershirefoodandfarmingpartnership.org/