New budget includes more funds to help feed impoverished families

• Author: Arutz Sheva Staff
• Published date: 08 November 2021
• Publication title: Israel National News (Israel)

The Israeli Ministry of Welfare in partnership with Colel Chabad officially launched the National Food Security Initiative in 2017 as a way to help over ten thousand families from falling further into a cycle of poverty. The program was an expansion of the support system started for 2,500 families in 2003 by Israeli businessman Moti Ben Moshe and further increased by Sir Len Blavtnik in 2006.

Rather than just providing direct handouts, the National Food Security Initiative, implemented by Colel Chabad and Leket Israel, is structured to provide food and support to help families become more fiscally responsible and engage in healthier eating practices.

Since its inception, the project has been allocated twenty million shekel annually from the government budget. Yet despite increased poverty and hunger which has only been further fueled by the practical and economic challenges from the coronavirus pandemic, the budget deadlock had prevented any further funding increases. The program was initially designed to help support 10,000 families but the need has since skyrocketed to as many as 30,000 families in need as of November 2021.

According to Mendy Blau, Israel Director of Colel Chabad, Israel's longest running social services organization, the budget passage could not have come too soon.

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"These 30,000 families, the most hard-hit out of 110,000 families living under...