'Our goal is to not even exist': Ankit Kawatra, Founder, Zomato Feeding India

821 million people go to bed hungry every single night.

194 million + of those are Indians.

It is a pity that in a world that thrives on excess consumption, 1 in every 9 people does not have enough to eat. The world produces enough food to feed 10 billion people, i.e. 1.5x of the entire world population. In India too, we produce enough to not just feed the entire population but there's excess food that gets exported.

We have done miserably on the food wastage front. An RTI reply revealed that around 62,000 tonnes of food grains, mainly rice and wheat, have rotted in the godowns of the Food Corporation of India (FCI) between 2011-12 and 2016-17, with Maharashtra topping the list.

While for most, these are statistics which, at best, draw armchair discussions, for Ankit Kawatra -Founder, Zomato Feeding India, it was reason enough to quit his job and start serving food to the hungry. As a 22-year-old, Ankit was at a wedding in Gurgaon where the vulgar wastage of food knocked his socks off. He spent a restless night tossing in bed unable to fathom the dichotomy between the haves and the have-nots and took it upon himself to do something. He started to go to weddings to pick up leftover food to serve the needy. However, his noble intentions found no takers in the beginning, and more often than not, he headed home disappointed. Some days, he was lucky. His vision was to reach out to more people as he knew he, on his own, could physically do only so much. He encouraged people and corporations to join in and volunteer or contribute. In just 6 years, the network grew to a mind-boggling 26,000+ volunteers in 104 cities, serving 90 million meals so far.

On the occasion of World Hunger Day, I spoke to Ankit Kawatra to know his views on the problem and his vision for a hunger-free world.

Q: Hi Ankit! A pleasure talking to you. I trust you are well. My first question is on how you envisioned Zomato Feeding India.

Ankit: Hi Anjana, Lovely talking to you. I hope you are keeping safe.

I was working for Gartner (erstwhile CEB) and started distributing food to the poor people at night, sneaking out without my parent's knowledge. Since I had a full-time day job, it became increasingly difficult to do both and one day, I decided to quit my job, a decision which my parents were unaware of for long! I had this compelling need to do something and Feeding India happened to me - there are some things in life that you don't plan but are planned for you, and this was one of them.

Q: Is Zomato Feeding India essentially run by volunteers? What is your modus operandi?

Ankit: We have a huge network of volunteers but we needed to create a sustainable model as sometimes volunteers may not be available due to exigencies or odd timings. We complemented them by starting delivery vans to make the entire process more organised and today, we have 82 delivery vans in 23 cities which collect surplus food every day from cafeterias, restaurants, wedding, airport lounges, colleges, hospitals, etc. at fixed timings & deliver at designated spots. We are now serving millions of meals every year with surplus food.

Our second initiative is Poshan to Pathshala - nutritious food to non-government schools. We work with partner kitchens to prepare fresh food and deliver to 8,000+ children daily who attend programs of NGOs working in slums that cannot afford to provide food.

Our third program is the Emergency Relief program that helps during times of emergencies. During Covid-19 we started the 'Feed the Daily Wager' campaign to support affected daily wage earners. We were able to serve 60+ million meals pan-India. Other campaigns in the past include Assam & Bihar foods, Cyclone Fani etc.

Lastly, we have the Happy Fridge program and under this, we have installed 155 fridges in 42 cities where people keep food. We have kept these at railway platforms also where people having excess food deposit it or even trains that have a pantry leave the leftover food.

Q: I think we have surplus food production in our country and the problem exists because of a mismatch - some are overfed and others underfed. While your organisation is doing a fantastic job, do you think the government can play a bigger role as it can reach out to far more people, create a system to ensure equitable distribution and also use legislation to ensure zero wastage?

Ankit: Yes, of course.

On the government's part, I think the present government is doing good work through the Mid Day Meal Scheme, PDS, ICDS, etc. but of course, there is so much more to be done. The need of the hour is to introduce protective and incentivising policies for both individuals as well as institutional donors, such as a Good Samaritan law to protect citizens and organisations who are donating food to people in need. Additionally, tax benefits for the F&B industry who donate products in kind should be explored. This will not just act as a catalyst to aid private contributions in the country, but will also empower people to start new ventures to combat hunger and food wastage.

However, I believe larger change can be created, when driven on its own by society and corporates, rather than being externally imposed by the government.

We have enough food to feed everyone on the planet. In India too, there is enough and more but equitable distribution and access to the right kind of food is still far away. With COVID, the number of hungry people has risen steeply, with the UN WFP mentioning that the number of “severe food insecure” individuals will nearly double this year!

In India, due to our population and other issues that stem from social and cultural divides, the problem is huge and the government needs to play a more active role in collaborating with NGOs, people working on the ground and, help organise the space. There are tremendous learnings that non-profits have acquired over time but these remain in silos and underutilised. With Zomato Feeding India, we learnt how a food recovery solution was possible at scale, which was earlier not given a shot. We all need to work together, learn from one another, and innovate aggressively to ensure that food is fairly distributed. Several western countries still struggle with more evolved forms of hunger, but data and structure of solutions are far more organised increasing the probability of making high impact projects and that’s where the government can do more.

Q: Do you think that the problem of hunger can ever be solved completely?

Ankit: Yes, I firmly believe it can be. My way of looking at our work has always been that we should not even exist to provide basic food to serve hungry people. We are here only because there are massive gaps and inequality.

The big change needed is in the way we understand hunger and how much of an effort we make to solve it. The way to reduce hunger is by making people independent, so they can earn the basic needs themselves, and not by making them dependent on your support. That’s why at Feeding India we support hungry people in the short term, and ensure investment is being made in making them independent in the long run. Hence, our 4 key beneficiary categories include children, the elderly, pregnant women, and the specially-abled who through education, skill development can become hunger-free and drop off the hunger list. We don't serve meals to beggars. It’s always about sustainable impact.

Q: Tell us more about your work during COVID.

Ankit: Before the lockdown was announced, Zomato Feeding India had already started the Feed the Daily Wager Relief program. We raised nearly 40 crores from corporates and individuals. The Zomato Feeding India team was able to serve more than 6,00,000 dry ration kits, serving 60+ million meals to daily wage earner families across 120+ cities, becoming one of the largest food donation drives in the country. All this, with most of us not being able to even move outside of our houses. This incentivized daily wage earners stay inside their houses rather than step out in search of food during the lockdown, and importantly reinstates how we can contain and solve big national problems if we all step forward and act together, trusting one another and in a transparent manner.

Q: In what ways can people contribute to Zomato Feeding India and what role do you think individuals can play in solving the problem of hunger?

Ankit: I think individuals have a big role to play. Start by making areas around you hunger-free. We have hundreds of Hunger Spots across the country where food is served. People can contribute towards serving them meals and even volunteer on ground (once there is more movement allowed). Serving a month of food for a child costs just Rs. 500.

This way, if more of us act locally, the large population that is sometimes deemed as the biggest of challenges, can pose as the biggest of solutions.

Q: You are now part of Zomato though you continue to exist independently. How has the association benefitted Zomato Feeding India?

Ankit: Zomato is one of the largest food-tech company in India. In February 2019, Feeding India joined Zomato to become Zomato Feeding India- Zomato’s CSR arm. I’ve been amazed to witness how socially conscious the teams are and their innate drive to make more impact and scale our operations. We now have access to lakhs of restaurants to partner for excess food, we had only 500 earlier. From serving 22.5+ million meals across 65 cities in four years (pre-Zomato) to now serving 75 million meals across 104 cities in just two years with Zomato, our impact has increased exponentially due to access to their great technology, partnership opportunities, and expertise.

Q: You won the Queen's Young Leader award some time back? How was your experience meeting the Queen of the United Kingdom?

Ankit: It is good to be acknowledged and it is very humbling each time we win any award. Every award is gratification and reconfirmation of the fact that we are on the right path. While it is a great motivation for a day, we don't rest on the laurels for long.

We take the award, come back home, and the next day and it is business as usual as we continue to focus on our work i.e. feeding the hungry.