RESORTS World Sentosa (RWS) made a S$300,000 contribution to Food from the Heart (FFTH) on Monday (Sep 4) to an initiative supporting the purchase of fresh local produce.

The partnership – RWS Eat Well @ Community Shop initiative – aims to improve access to fresh and nutritious food for lower-income families.

The project follows the non-profit organisation’s dipstick survey which revealed that more families have adapted their grocery shopping strategies to cope with higher living costs. Among such strategies was opting only for food with a longer shelf life.

For example, homemaker Siti Rosninah’s grocery choices at the Community Shop @ Boon Lay focused mainly on non-perishables such as cooking oil and canned food, as it helped to stretch her family’s household expenses through the months.

She said: “If I choose to get spinach, that can only last my big family for one meal. But if I choose biscuits and bread spreads, my children can have them over many meals. The savings on food can instead go into paying other bills, like electricity and my children’s stationery.”

This, however, comes at the expense of balanced nutrition.

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FFTH has witnessed an increase in cases such as Rosninah’s, and noted that the fresh food category represented a mere 5 per cent of total redemptions across its four Community shops.

Hence, through the programme with RWS, every household served by the Community Shops can now select two additional items from the fresh food category every month for free, complementing the existing 12 essential non-perishable food items that each household is entitled to.

Loh Su Kim, senior vice-president of attractions and sustainability at RWS, said: “The initiative addresses two key focuses that are in line with our community development efforts. First, we hope to foster healthier eating habits among vulnerable groups by helping them to get better access to fresh and nutritious food. Second, we endeavour to support our local farming community by purchasing supplies from them to help forge a more resilient and sustainable future for all, especially Singapore’s food landscape.”