Jack Humphry was busy last week collecting food donated by Hamilton schools to the Hamilton Combined Christian Food Bank.
The annual Christmas appeal, organised by Methodist City Action, collects from Hamilton Boys' High School, Southwell, St Paul's Collegiate and Waikato Diocesan.
Methodist appeal coordinator Wendy Nickalls said the Christmas appeal was going well with students and families being very generous. More than 1000 tins of food and foodstuffs were collected from each school.
Humphry said demand for the food bank's services continued to rise with high rentals and debts forcing some lower-income families and individuals to ask for food help.
During most of the year the food bank would average 16 food parcels a day. This ramps up to 30 a day in the approach to Christmas, he said. Methodist City Action is one of seven groups acting as collection points for the combined food bank's Christmas appeal. In the 2014-15 year the food bank supplied 2831 food parcels to about 9200 adults and children - about 8 per cent of Hamilton's population.
Despite the food donated, the food bank spends more than $1000 a week to cover the short fall between donations and demand.
The food bank praised Ebbett Volkswagen for the donation of a VW Transporter van, which greatly helped collection.