Meals on Wheels

It’s 1pm on a Saturday in a squatter camp in Hatcliffe, a short drive out of Harare, and a large crowd of children, ranging from little kids to teenagers, is milling around. Many have been there for hours, running around and playing games. But they are not just there to hang out, they are waiting for lunch - which may be the only proper meal they get all week - to be served from MOBI, Zimbabwe’s first mobile soup kitchen.

Equipped with just a portable gas stove and two enormous cooking pots fitted in the back of a Toyota truck, the MOBI Soup Kitchen feeds up to 700 kids in Hatcliffe every Saturday, up to 400 hundred in Epworth on Wednesdays and as many as 1,100 in Goromonzi on Thursdays. Since it started in 2021, MOBI’s founder Nicole Rautenbach estimates the charity has served 50,000 meals to children and teenagers, typically of rice, beans and vegetables washed down with maheu maize drink. Chicken, duck and beef are also frequently on the menu and fresh vegetables always feature.

MOBI is a truly grassroots enterprise. One hundred per cent of the food is donated by local businesses, including Pro Brands and Pomona Food Market, the truck and fuel are gifted by Green Fuel and Slab Sales provides regular funding. Meanwhile, local volunteers from the communities help with the food preparation, cooking and cleaning.

The idea was born out of the urgent need to get food out to vulnerable and isolated communities during the Covid-19 pandemic, Nicole explains. She was working for a homeless charity in Harare at the time which tried to help by offering weekly and daily outreach programs, but access was an issue. “We were being contacted by hundreds of people in lockdown with no money or food saying they were starving and begging us to bring them food but we had no way to help them. The majority of the people lived in what is essentially defined as a ‘squatter camp’ with no electricity, no running water, no sewerage system and no formal structures and so gaining access to them with supplies and assistance was very difficult,” she says.

It was from this experience that the idea for the MOBI was born. Nicole decided that what would work best was a mobile soup kitchen which could quickly respond to crises by bringing food to areas in need. “I came up with the idea of the truck and I just felt compelled to make it work,” Nicole says.

Nicole quit her job to launch MOBI in Hatcliffe and soon 700 hungry children were showing up with plates and makeshift lunch boxes every week. As the numbers grew, so did Nicole’s ambition for the soup kitchen which she realised needed to offer communities more than just meals on wheels. “My initial vision for the truck was that it would be zooming all over the country feeding people. But I realised pretty quickly that you can’t just go somewhere, feed people and leave; you have to get to know the communities and help them in lots of other ways,” she says.

Now, alongside offering a weekly meal, MOBI also pays the school fees and buys books, shoes and uniforms for ten children from Hatcliffe. The charity has also facilitated urgent hospital care for some infants with acute malnutrition, as well as sourcing clothing and blankets for the community. This year, the charity even delivered Christmas presents to 600 children. “We’ve grown into a support system for these communities because they have no access to alternative assistance,” Nicole says.

The Saturday soup kitchen also offers families a fun social event, according to Earl, MOBI’s manager. “It’s a happy time for them, they come and have a decent meal but we also all hang out and play games,” he says.

The soup kitchen is also supported by a strong network of volunteers, mostly mothers and teenagers from the communities, who help prepare the food, cook and clean. Their help is invaluable, Earl said, but they are happy to do it.

A volunteer, Beauty, who lives in Hatcliffe with her five children, says MOBI had made a positive impact. “The kids in this community used to suffer a lot, you could see just by looking at them, they were skinny. But now they are growing and they have chubby cheeks.” Beauty’s 14-year-old daughter, Tatenda, also helps out on Saturdays. “I am happy to see the little ones getting food, we are so grateful to the soup kitchen,” she says.

Another volunteer, Melody, said that her two children have benefited hugely from the MOBI meals but also the blankets and clothes the charity has provided. “I’m so grateful for what MOBI is doing.”

MOBI has also grown rapidly in the two years since it launched, expanding from Hatcliffe into two new sites in Epworth and Goromonzi. But Nicole doesn’t want to stop there. The founder hopes to get a second truck, and also wants to raise funds to sponsor additional children through school and then start looking into apprenticeship schemes for the older ones. She also hopes to ramp up MOBI’s medical assistance. Her ambition is to have a doctor or nurse come with the soup kitchen when it visits communities.

“These kids are going to grow up with so many issues because they’re sick and there is no one to help them,” says Nicole. Luckily they have her - but she’s going to need our help too.

Sophie Edwards

Instagram: @mobizw
To support MOBI’s School Fee Campaign, call: +263 777 370 926. There is also
a donation box at the Fridge Kitchen,
63 Ridgeway North, Harare.

MEALS ON WHEELS