Tinned Pears is a motivational piece behind the #EndChildFoodPoverty campaign. It was dreamed up by Lancashire, England filmmaker Libby Burke Wilde after her time volunteering for Chefs In Schools. It's a jigsaw of true stories that herself and the charity had read and learned first-hand. Lucy MacCarthy then wrote the piece. The film was written in August and delivered in October in time for half term and to join the #endchildfoodpoverty campaign.

The #EndChildFoodPoverty campaign is calling on the Government to implement three recommendations from the National Food Strategy:

• Expand eligibility for free school meals to all who need them
  
• Make free school meals and activities available during school holidays
  
• Increase the value and reach of Healthy Start vouchers

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Burke-Wilde "During the lockdown in London 2020 I found myself with a lot of time on my hands. Being a director of short films and commercials my industry completely shut down in March. I wanted to do something to help my local community during this difficult time. Through a chance encounter, I met Patrick - one of the chefs who had been volunteering with Chefs in Schools - and asked if they needed any volunteers. Two days later I was in Grasmere kitchen, dividing up vats of soup in to 200 meal containers. Working in the kitchen was an eye opener for me. Physically seeing the food divided up in to hampers by volunteers, then loaded on to vans and delivered all over Hackney made the volume of people in need feel unbearably big. Physically helping to pack over 300,000 meals, and meeting the families who were receiving the hampers made me want to do more.  

Once the lockdown eased and the kids went back to school, the hamper program was scaled back, but the people living in food poverty continues. Chefs in Schools approached me to make a documentary about the work they had done over lockdown, but instead we decided to make Tinned Pears. We felt that a short film made up of true stories that we had read and learned first-hand was the key to getting people to connect with what is a point of national shame. No child should be going hungry, but they are. All over the UK. In 2020.  A lot of people don’t know that food poverty is so prevalent in the UK. I hope that this film is, at the very least, an eye opener to people, a conversation starter. I hope that this film shines a light on the work that charities like Chefs in Schools are doing and moves people to action. "