Bro Myrddin Community Fund awards £6,000 to help tackle food poverty and debt in Carmarthen

Carmarthen Foodbank and Carmarthen Community Money Advice service has been awarded £6,000 from Bro Myrddin's Housing Association's Community Fund.

Hilary Jones, Chief Executive of Bro Myrddin Housing Association and the Bro Myrddin Team visit the Foodbank with Cath Cork, Carmarthen Foodbank Manager

The two projects run by Towy Community Church's Xcel Project deliver emergency food parcels and free face-to-face debt advice to individuals and families within the Carmarthen area, including Bro Myrddin tenants, who are facing poverty and financial hardship. To meet their immediate needs but also address the long term causes of debt and give them the tools to gain control of their finances moving forward.

The fund awarded would be to support ongoing services in the following ways:

·        £4,000 - Towards the Foodbank food stores - the team now have to purchase a percentage of food due to a drop in food donations (due to cost of living and less people able to give);

·        £2,000 – To cover the cost of 42 hours of debt support and management to clients at the Community Money Advice drop-in.

An average food parcel costs £30 per person per week, the £4,000 from the fund would help approx. 133 individuals or more individuals if the money is spent on a particular item that’s in short supply.

A client to the Money Advice centre receives 6 hours of support over 4 sessions with our advisors, the £2,000 from the fund would cover the cost of our advisors supporting 7 clients in managing or writing off their debt. The outcome for the client going through the advice sessions means they can gain up to £3,600 in benefit assistance and have help managing an average debt of £9,000. 

In 2024, the Carmarthen Foodbank supported 3,362 people in total, fulfilling 100 vouchers which fed 141 Bro Myrddin tenants specifically and 86 of their children through the referral system.

The Carmarthen Community Money Advice (CMA) supported Carmarthenshire residents in 2024, by writing-off over £100,000 of debt through Debt Relief Orders and are helping clients manage over £500,000 through debt management and advocacy work in total.

Since the project began Carmarthen CMA has supported a number of Bro Myrddin tenants amongst the above residents to tackle their debt which has included utility debts, rent arears and council tax payments.

"We appreciate our ongoing collaboration with the Association and our joint impact on the community of Carmarthen to recover from food and financial poverty." - Siân Wood, Foodbank and CMA project Fundraiser.