RRT DONATES 42,000 SMARRT COOKIE NUTRITIONAL BARS FOR LOCAL SCHOOLS

The Rapid Relief Team (RRT) is supporting children from disadvantaged backgrounds with tens of thousands of nutritious Smarrt Cookie bars being distributed to primary schools across Australia.

RRT is made up of volunteers of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church.

With the connection between good nutrition and successful learning well known, 42,000 Smarrt Cookie bars are being shared with schools in 83 regions across Australia.

The initiative aims to assist in the fight against hunger in primary school aged children and break down the barrier hunger can play in distracting children from their education.

A Nutritional Option

RRT’s Smarrt Cookie nutritional bars are created by nutritionists and have a balance of energy, protein, carbohydrates, fats and fibre in equal proportions of daily intake values, including 10 vitamins and six minerals.

“There is an increasing difficulty for lower-income families to provide healthy food amidst cost-of-living pressures,” Dan Alderton, National Operations Director for RRT said.

“The Smarrt Cookie bar builds upon our extensive experience in providing food and care to the vulnerable as well as to disaster locations following fires, drought and flood,” Dan said.

“We hope this helps more Australian kids reach their full potential.”

Designed to be complementary to existing school breakfast programs or, where they aren’t in place, RRT’s Smarrt Cookie initiative will help school communities meet the nutrition gap for students in need.

The Smarrt Cookie initiative was developed in collaboration with Cookie Time in New Zealand, as part of their One Square Meal (OSM) Everyday Nutrition range, delivering ‘plant-based products with nutritional credentials’.

Building on RRT’s Extensive Experience

Foodbank’s Australian Hunger Report of 2019 highlighted more than 815,000 Australians receive food relief each month, with one third of these children.

The Smarrt Cookies build on RRT’s existing Food Box program – providing emergency food supplies for people and families in need.

The RRT Food Box contains a variety of non-perishable, long-life food and can feed a family of four for up to 48 hours.

9,585 Food Boxes were donated by RRT in 2020.

The Plymouth Brethren Christian Church established the RRT in 2013 to express the Church’s principles of care and compassion.

The RRT is staffed by Church volunteers who provide catering services at a range of charitable events and emergencies.

Globally, the RRT has more than 14,500 volunteers and operates in Australia, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, France, the United States, Canada and Germany.