Chocolate and Sweeties are not the first items you think of when you want to help the war refugees fleeing Ukraine. But in a heart-rending story in The Telegraph, (March 9th), Wojciech Bakun, the Mayor of Przemysl, a town in southeastern Poland of 60,442 inhabitants, was quoted as saying: ‘We need Chocolate and Sweeties for the children. It’s the only thing that makes them smile. We’ve got through a huge amount of Chocolate and Sweeties, but now we need much more, it’s what the kids want.’
Chocolate and Sweeties : Can you help? As we reported recently, Phil Reynolds, MD of Trade Events, the company that runs the three Vendex shows, is on the case – but he needs our help… ‘I have a contact in Poland who is in the vending industry. I got in touch with him to see if he could help’ Phil said. ‘He has arranged for a lorry to travel to the UK to collect supplies and he’s also been in touch with the local authorities in the area, to arrange for distribution of the cargo to those Ukrainian refugees who have made it across the border into Poland.
‘Right now, they are waiting to see how many pallets of stock there will be before deciding what size of truck to send over’, Phil updated us. ‘We’ve agreed to cover the transport costs back to Poland.’
Please, if you have any protein bars, chocolate or snacks – Chocolate and Sweeties ! – that you can spare for these poor kids, let Phil know as soon as you can. We understand that donated stock is being gathered at Morvend’s warehouse, in Ipswich.
To contact Phil, click HERE
Thank-you to all those who have responded so far – but so much more is needed.
There’s a video of refugees arriving in Poland on The BBC News web site. It was posted 6 days ago; since when the situation has deteriorated. You can see it HERE
