The trustees present their annual report and financial statements for the year ended 31 March 2025.
The financial statements have been prepared in accordance with the accounting policies set out in note 1 to the financial statements and comply with the charity's Memorandum and Articles of Association, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005, the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended), the Companies Act 2006 and "Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) (effective 1 January 2019)".
As an organisation, Nourish exists to :
advance environmental protection by promoting sustainable food systems;
encourage and support communities in actively participating in the development of public policy as it relates to food and agriculture, and in developing sustainable local food networks;
promote and strengthen the voice of voluntary and civil society organisations working on improving food systems:
prevent and relieve poverty, with particular emphasis on food poverty and insecurity, and
promote and advance the right to food as a fundamental human right.
We do so in a manner which:
respects the values and principles of co-operation and co-operative activity, in particular the values of self-help; self-responsibility, democracy, equality and solidarity and the ethical values of honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others, and
respects the principles of equality of opportunity and avoids any form of discrimination whether on the grounds of sex, marital status, race, ethnic origin, gender, sexual preference age, disability, religion and otherwise.
We believe tasty and nutritious food should be accessible to everyone, be sustainable, and be produced, processed, sold and served in a way that values and respects workers. We campaign for solutions that work across the board: we take a systems approach toward food and health, poverty, fairness, workers' rights, rural economy, environment, climate change, land use, and waste.
During the year, our focus was on 5 primary areas of work:
right to food
healthy food environments
local food
food, climate and nature
good food nation
Right to food
The right to food continues to be the core principle for all of our work. We delivered a number of projects during the year focusing on affordability of a good diet and ending the need for food banks.
Our Dignity in Practice Project involves people who design, deliver and take part in responses to food insecurity in reflective practice and peer support activities aimed at promoting dignity and human rights. During the year we continued to support the Dignity Peer Network of third sector organisations from across Scotland to meet monthly and provide a safe space of peer learning. Our focus has shifted to promoting cash-first and supporting good cash-first practice on the ground.
We also delivered two learning exchanges for food pantries and community meals to allow participants to learn more about the detail of what dignity means in practice within these models. Both programmes were based on a process of peer-to-peer learning, reflection and review from participating organisations.
We continued the work on Our Right to Food project which set out to explore what ‘adequate’ means in terms of the ‘right to adequate food’ as outlined in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The first iteration of the project (2020-2023) focused on white Scottish food culture. For the second iteration we selected Pakistani food culture as the second biggest ethnic group in Scotland.
The project followed the original methodology. We worked with a group of 12 ‘community advisors’ - people with experience of shopping and cooking for a Pakistani household. Together, we developed a shared account of how a recognisable Pakistani family might get through the week with food in a way which was healthy enough; a good fit with people’s lives, and with food that people would enjoy. This was translated into a typical shopping basket which can be used as a tool to understand and measure the right to food. We also considered the dimension of sustainability, estimating the carbon footprint with the support of researched from the University of Edinburgh.
The report ‘Our Right to Food: Pakistani Households in Scotland’ was published in March 2025.
Throughout the year we have continued to work with the Meaningful Participation Panel of experts-by-experience, passionate about making decision-making processes more equitable, diverse, and inclusive. The Panel supported the development of recruitment tools for the Dignity Dialogues to find people with lived experience of food insecurity to be community advisors for the project. They also supported the design of the pop-up suppers for our Public Diners work.
We continued our work as Learning Partners for the Cash First Project. This collaborative project had started in November 2023 and involves supporting eight local authorities who were piloting a range of cash-first interventions designed to reduce the need for foodbanks and promote access to cash through crisis grants and welfare rights advice. Their project activities included mapping community food aid and related support for food insecure households in their region, mainstreaming and improving access to food- and cash- support, increasing engagement with wrap-around support services, improving access to support for a range of harder-to-reach food-insecure individuals and households. As Learning Partners, we brought together the eight local authorities in monthly online meetings, using the Action Learning Set format. We also hosted meetings with guest speakers around popular themes that included the meaning and impact of No Recourse to Public Funding status, household support for debt management, learning from people with lived experience, and project evaluation methods. We also brought the local authorities together with their partners (NGOs, food banks and pantries, Citizen Advice Bureaux, and academics), the Scottish Government and the project’s evaluator in carefully planned all-day events in Aberdeen, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Stirling.
Healthy food environment
Following the success of the Yes to Veg! Nursery Project which aims to make it easier for children under 5 to eat and enjoy vegetables in a fun and interactive way. This is done by improving the food environment within nurseries, making veg more accessible and helping them take an active role in the process. We further piloted the programme in 26 nurseries in Glasgow in partnership with Thrive Under Five.
Throughout the year we continued our work on public diners – state-supported, affordable restaurants offering high-quality, healthy meals to the general public. In September 2024 we published the report ‘Public diners: The idea whose time has come’, based on the co-production conference we held earlier that year. The repot was widely read, and received media coverage in BBC Scotland radio, The Times radio, the Scotsman, the Herald and the Guardian.
We also launched the community research project looking at the history of British and Civic restaurants in the UK and similar initiatives overseas. This work involved some 100 community researchers, collecting oral histories from members of the public who have first-hand memories of state-run restaurants in Britain and conducting extensive desk-based research into archival materials online, through local studies departments and in the National Archives. Based on the findings we created a travelling exhibition outlining historical and contemporary examples or public restaurants. The exhibition launch took place in March in Glenrothes, Fife and was attended by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, Jenny Gilruth MSP.
In October, we launched a series of pop-up suppers – informal community consultation events and opportunities to popularise the concept and heritage of public dining. We held the flagship supper in Glasgow attended by 70 people and a second supper on Skye.
Alongside community engagement, we continued our engagement with colleagues in policy circles. This included presentation to the Manchester Sustainable Food Places network, London Food Board, Fife Council, and Scottish Borders Council.
Finally, we started hosting an international learning network on public restaurants with Mark Bittman and his Community Kitchen project in the US and Public Food / Mensa Mensa in the Netherlands.
Local Food
This year we continued to facilitate the growing network of 17 Sustainable Food Places (SFP) in Scotland, as part of UK wide network of over 110 food partnerships. Food partnerships bring together key stakeholders from right across the local food system, from the local authority, Health Board and public sector establishments to food growers, retailers, and the hospitality sector.
There are food partnerships in over half of all Scotland’s land’s local authority areas, covering over three quarters of the population and are a key mechanism to support the development and delivery of Local Good Food Nation Plans.
As part of a joint UK bid we were able to secure a further 3 years of funding from Esmee Fairburn to further support the network, especially in developing structures and mechanisms for it to become ‘self-governed’ and move towards financial sustainability. As part of this process Nourish Scotland became a full partner organisation, sitting on UK Project Management Board alongside Food Matters, Food Sense Wales, Nourish NI, Soil Association and Sustain.
Food, climate and nature
Nourish is the nation partner on the UK-wide Bridging the Gap initiative which pilots ways demonstrate policy levers that would enable people on a low income to access climate and nature friendly food. We explored numerous project ideas with partners before focusing on two Scottish pilots in Aberdeenshire and Edinburgh. In Aberdeenshire, Soil Association Scotland have been working with a farmer using organic peas as a rotational crop to improve soil health to bring this crop into school kitchens. In Edinburgh we partnered with Edinburgh Community Food and local producers to provide organic fruit and veg to lower income families at a similar price point as those produced ‘conventionally’. Each pilot ran over the course of 2 years and at this point were starting to deliver outputs that would ultimately be worked into case studies and UK / nation specific policy asks.
We also formalised our work with The Scottish Crofting Federation, the Food and Farming Countryside Commission, Landworkers’ Alliance, Pasture for Life, Soil Association Scotland, the Nature Friendly Farming Network and Propagate by launching the Scottish Agroecology Partnership. Our vision is for agriculture in Scotland to be healthy for soil, land and people; and for farmers, crofters and landworkers to have equitable access to skills and knowledge and meaningful participation in policy-making. Our work has included developing governance mechanisms for the partnership as well as a public-facing presence. We have also co-developed seven policy asks with the farmers, crofters and growers who are members of the nine organisations.
We also continued to support the Scottish Organic Stakeholders Group (SOSG) with making the case to the Scottish Government to prepare a new Scottish Organic Action Plan. We produced a first SOSG Newsletter and organised a reception at the June 2024 Royal Highland Show at Ingleston. In early 2025, we drafted ten case studies to showcase the solid basis of good practice on which the new Plan can build, and these are designed to be included in the new Plan at its launch. The launch was postponed (now expected in early 2026) but the SOSG continues to support the Organic Developer based in Scotland Food & Drink on delivering some of the on-going work that is expected to be announced as part of the Plan’s activities.
Throughout the year, we continued participating on the Agricultural Reform Programme. This included active involvement in both the Agriculture and Rural Communities Bill and the Government’s proposals to replace the Common Agricultural Policy with a Scottish system of farm support. Working with Scottish Environment Link, we engaged with Ministers and civil servants and spoke to numerous MSPs in an effort to strengthen the provisions of the Bill. As a member of the Agricultural Reform Implementation and Oversight Board, we contributed to detailed discussions about the operation of the new scheme and achieved some success in maintaining a focus on climate and nature in the scheme design.
This financial year saw the conclusion of the South Asia Nitrogen Hub project which aimed to reduce nitrogen use across the region. To mark the end of the project, we co-hosted a Parliamentary reception in October 2024. The reception was attended by project partners and researchers from South Asia, academics, Scottish Government civil servants and policymakers.
Finally, we further developed our work on aquatic foods in Scotland. The Fish+ in the Good Food Nation Panel is a partnership project with between Nourish and Seafood Scotland. It seeks to bring together a broad range of perspectives across the aquatic foods sector, including small and large producers using different fishing methods, processors, retailers, coastal communities, public health, conservation, animal welfare, and workers’ rights representatives. The aim of the panel is to build common ground among diverse stakeholders on how to make fish a key part of the Good Food Nation ambition.
Good Food Nation
Throughout the year, we continued to convene the Scottish Food Coalition. In August 2024, we convened a Coalition meeting in Stirling to chart the path forward, following the adoption of the Good Food Nation Act. It was clear from the meeting that the energy to do so was high and so started the process of developing a revised set of core principles and asks:
The right to food and the right to a healthy environment being enshrined in Scots law.
The Scottish Food Commission engaging meaningfully with civil society when carrying out its duties.
Scottish Government adequately supporting and resourcing the development and long-term delivery of Local Good Food Nation Plans.
Local Good Food Nation Plans must being developed and delivered as part of fully collaborative partnerships.
We also co-developed programme of work looking towards the publication of the first National Good Food Nation Plan and beyond. As part of this, in early Spring 2025 we started planning work on a series of Good Food Nation Guidance Briefings on topics such as animal welfare and workers rights. These will be aimed at local authorities and health boards to inform and encourage them to be more ambitious around the outcomes of the Good Food Nation Act in their local food plans once they start work on these in the years ahead.
We also continued our work with the Living Good Food Nation Lab, hosted by the University of Edinburgh. The Lab is a dynamic collaboration among academics, policymakers, and civil society dedicated to investigating and supporting the rollout and implementation of the Good Food Nation Act, in particular in relation to local authorities and health boards. During the year, the Lab established a community of practice and focused on collating available baseline data for monitoring the implementation of the Local Good Food Nation Plans.
We received total income of £685,003 (2024: £686,218) and incurred a total of £667,823 (2024: £716,048) by way of expenditure leaving net income of £17,180 (2024: Loss of £29,830) as shown in the Statement of Financial Activities. Our main source of income comes from grants and our main item of expenditure continues to be staff costs. Further details of income and expenditure is given in the Statement of Financial Activities and notes to the financial statements.
In respect of reserves, we have a policy of maintaining reserves to protect us against unforeseen fluctuations in income. The policy is to maintain unrestricted general funds at a level which would enable us to continue provision of our services if our sources of income were to cease or be delayed significantly in their payment. We consider that it is prudent for us to aim to cover three months worth of expenditure by way of reserve. At 31 March 2025, we aim to build upon the level of unrestricted funds in line with this policy.
The trustees have assessed the major risks to which the charity is exposed, and are satisfied that systems are in place to mitigate exposure to the major risks.
Nourish (Scotland) is a company limited by guarantee and a registered charity, governed by its Memorandum and Articles of Association.
Potential new Trustees are invited to attend board meetings to see if they wish to be elected. New Trustees receive appropriate induction and training.
Administrative Details
Charity number SC048239
Company number SC417014
Registered office Summerhall, 1 Summerhall Place, Edinburgh, EH9 1PL
Trustees P M Abel (Resigned 10 September 2024)
P J Ritchie - Executive Director
B E Wynne (Resigned 10 September 2024)
J Ellis
J Foggie (Resigned 15 May 2024)
D Flint
S Conway
L Goldie
I Fletcher (Appointed 18 March 2025)
J F Jones (Appointed 18 June 2025)
Auditor
3 Castle Court
Carnegie Campus
Dunfermline
KY11 8PB
The trustees, who are also the directors of Nourish (Scotland) for the purpose of company law, are responsible for preparing the Trustees' Report and the financial statements in accordance with applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).
Company law requires the trustees to prepare financial statements for each financial year which give a true and fair view of the state of affairs of the charity and of the incoming resources and application of resources, including the income and expenditure, of the charitable company for that year.
In preparing these financial statements, the trustees are required to:
- select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;
- observe the methods and principles in the Charities SORP;
- make judgements and estimates that are reasonable and prudent;
- state whether applicable UK Accounting Standards have been followed, subject to any material departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements; and
- prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the charity will continue in operation.
The trustees are responsible for keeping adequate accounting records that disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the charity and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Companies Act 2006, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 and the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the charity and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.
The trustees are responsible for the maintenance and integrity of the charity and financial information included on the charity's website. Legislation in the United Kingdom governing the preparation and dissemination of financial statements may differ from legislation in other jurisdictions.
A resolution proposing that Thomson Cooper be reappointed as auditor of the company will be put at a General Meeting.
The trustees' report was approved by the Board of Trustees.
Opinion
We have audited the financial statements of Nourish (Scotland) (the ‘charity’) for the year ended 31 March 2025 which comprise the statement of financial activities, the balance sheet, the statement of cash flows and notes to the financial statements, including significant accounting policies. The financial reporting framework that has been applied in their preparation is applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards, including Financial Reporting Standard 102 The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).
In our opinion, the financial statements:
Basis for opinion
We conducted our audit in accordance with International Standards on Auditing (UK) (ISAs (UK)) and applicable law. Our responsibilities under those standards are further described in the Auditor's responsibilities for the audit of the financial statements section of our report. We are independent of the charity in accordance with the ethical requirements that are relevant to our audit of the financial statements in the UK, including the FRC’s Ethical Standard, and we have fulfilled our other ethical responsibilities in accordance with these requirements. We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our opinion.
In auditing the financial statements, we have concluded that the trustees' use of the going concern basis of accounting in the preparation of the financial statements is appropriate.
Based on the work we have performed, we have not identified any material uncertainties relating to events or conditions that, individually or collectively, may cast significant doubt on the charity’s ability to continue as a going concern for a period of at least twelve months from when the financial statements are authorised for issue.
Our responsibilities and the responsibilities of the trustees with respect to going concern are described in the relevant sections of this report.
Other information
The other information comprises the information included in the annual report other than the financial statements and our auditor's report thereon. The trustees are responsible for the other information contained within the annual report. Our opinion on the financial statements does not cover the other information and we do not express any form of assurance conclusion thereon. Our responsibility is to read the other information and, in doing so, consider whether the other information is materially inconsistent with the financial statements or our knowledge obtained in the course of the audit, or otherwise appears to be materially misstated. If we identify such material inconsistencies or apparent material misstatements, we are required to determine whether this gives rise to a material misstatement in the financial statements themselves. If, based on the work we have performed, we conclude that there is a material misstatement of this other information, we are required to report that fact.
We have nothing to report in this regard.
We have nothing to report in respect of the following matters in relation to which the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 requires us to report to you if, in our opinion:
the information given in the financial statements is inconsistent in any material respect with the trustees' report; or
proper accounting records have not been kept; or
the financial statements are not in agreement with the accounting records; or
we have not received all the information and explanations we require for our audit.
As explained more fully in the statement of trustees' responsibilities, the trustees, who are also the directors of the charity for the purpose of company law, are responsible for the preparation of the financial statements and for being satisfied that they give a true and fair view, and for such internal control as the trustees determine is necessary to enable the preparation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error. In preparing the financial statements, the trustees are responsible for assessing the charity’s ability to continue as a going concern, disclosing, as applicable, matters related to going concern and using the going concern basis of accounting unless the trustees either intend to liquidate the charitable company or to cease operations, or have no realistic alternative but to do so.
We have been appointed as auditor under section 44(1)(c) of the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 and report in accordance with the Act and relevant regulations made or having effect thereunder.
Our objectives are to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements as a whole are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and to issue an auditor's report that includes our opinion. Reasonable assurance is a high level of assurance but is not a guarantee that an audit conducted in accordance with ISAs (UK) will always detect a material misstatement when it exists. Misstatements can arise from fraud or error and are considered material if, individually or in the aggregate, they could reasonably be expected to influence the economic decisions of users taken on the basis of these financial statements.
The extent to which our procedures are capable of detecting irregularities, including fraud, is detailed below.
We considered the opportunities and incentives that may exist within the organisation for fraud and identified the greatest potential for fraud in the following areas: existence and timing of recognition of income and posting of unusual journals along with complex transactions. We discussed these risks with management, designed audit procedures to test the timing and existence of revenue, tested a sample of journals to confirm they were appropriate and reviewed areas of judgement for indicators of management bias to address these risks.
We identified areas of laws and regulations that could reasonably be expected to have a material effect on the financial statements from our sector experience and through discussion with the officers and other management (as required by the auditing standards).
We reviewed the laws and regulations in areas that directly affect the financial statements including financial and taxation legislation and considered the extent of compliance with those laws and regulations as part of our procedures on the related financial statement items.
With the exception of any known or possible non-compliance with relevant and significant laws and regulations, and as required by the auditing standards, our work in respect of these was limited to enquiry of the officers and management of the charity.
We communicated identified laws and regulations throughout our team and remained alert to any indications of non-compliance throughout the audit.
Owing to the inherent limitations of an audit, there is an unavoidable risk that we may not have detected some material misstatements in the financial statements, even though we have properly planned and performed our audit in accordance with auditing standards. We are not responsible for preventing non-compliance and cannot be expected to detect non-compliance with all laws and regulations.
These inherent limitations are particularly significant in the case of misstatement resulting from fraud as this may involve sophisticated schemes designed to avoid detection, including deliberate failure to record transactions, collusion or the provision of intentional misrepresentations.
A further description of our responsibilities is available on the Financial Reporting Council’s website at: https://www.frc.org.uk/auditorsresponsibilities. This description forms part of our auditor's report.
Use of our report
This report is made solely to the charitable company's members, as a body, in accordance with Chapter 3 of Part 16 of the Companies Act 2006 and to the charity's directors, as a body, in accordance with Section 44(1) (c) of the Charities and Trustees Investment (Scotland) Act and regulation 10 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006. Our audit work has been undertaken so that we might state to the charity's trustees those matters we are required to state to them in an auditor's report and for no other purpose. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the charity and the charity’s trustees as a body, for our audit work, for this report, or for the opinions we have formed.
Thomson Cooper is eligible for appointment as auditor of the charity by virtue of its eligibility for appointment as auditor of a company under section 1212 of the Companies Act 2006.
The statement of financial activities includes all gains and losses recognised in the year. All income and expenditure derive from continuing activities.
The statement of financial activities includes all gains and losses recognised in the year. All income and expenditure derive from continuing activities.
Nourish (Scotland) is a private company limited by guarantee incorporated in Scotland. The registered office is Summerhall Place, Edinburgh, EH9 1PL.
As the charity is a company limited by guarantee and has no share capital, the liability of each member in the event of winding-up is limited to £1.
The financial statements have been prepared in accordance with the charity's Memorandum and Articles of Association, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005, the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended), the Companies Act 2006, FRS 102 “The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland” (“FRS 102”) and the Charities SORP "Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102)" (effective 1 January 2019). The charity is a Public Benefit Entity as defined by FRS 102.
The financial statements are prepared in sterling, which is the functional currency of the charity. Monetary amounts in these financial statements are rounded to the nearest £.
The financial statements have been prepared under the historical cost convention. The principal accounting policies adopted are set out below.
At the time of approving the financial statements, the trustees have a reasonable expectation that the charity has adequate resources to continue in operational existence for a minimum of 12 months from the date of approval of the financial statement. Thus the trustees continue to adopt the going concern basis of accounting in preparing the financial statements.
Unrestricted funds are available for use at the discretion of the trustees in furtherance of their charitable objectives.
Restricted funds are subject to specific conditions by donors or grantors as to how they may be used. The purposes and uses of the restricted funds are set out in the notes to the financial statements.
Cash donations are recognised on receipt. Other donations are recognised once the charity has been notified of the donation, unless performance conditions require deferral of the amount. Income tax recoverable in relation to donations received under Gift Aid or deeds of covenant is recognised at the time of the donation.
Grant income is recognised in the year in which it is receivable, which is when the charity becomes unconditionally entitled to the resource. Deferred income includes grants received for future periods, which is released to incoming resources in the period for which it is receivable, as well as annual payments in advance for services received. Where grants, including capital grants, or other income are received for a specific purpose, they are included within restricted income and any unexpended portion is carried forward as a restricted fund.
Assets or gifts in kin received and retained by the charity are recognised as income when received and are included at market value or at an estimate of their value where market value is not readily known.
Liabilities are recognised as expenditure as soon as there is a legal or constructive obligation committing the charity to expenditure, it is probable that settlement will be required and the amount of the obligation can be measured reliably. All expenditure is accounted for on an accruals basis and has been classified under headings appropriate to the charity's circumstances.
Tangible fixed assets are initially measured at cost and subsequently measured at cost or valuation, net of depreciation and any impairment losses.
Depreciation is recognised so as to write off the cost or valuation of assets less their residual values over their useful lives on the following bases. Expenditure below £1,000 is not capitalised.
The gain or loss arising on the disposal of an asset is determined as the difference between the sale proceeds and the carrying value of the asset, and is recognised in the statement of financial activities.
At each reporting end date, the charity reviews the carrying amounts of its tangible assets to determine whether there is any indication that those assets have suffered an impairment loss. If any such indication exists, the recoverable amount of the asset is estimated in order to determine the extent of the impairment loss (if any).
Cash and cash equivalents include cash in hand, deposits held at call with banks, other short-term liquid investments with original maturities of three months or less, and bank overdrafts. Bank overdrafts are shown within borrowings in current liabilities.
The charity has elected to apply the provisions of Section 11 ‘Basic Financial Instruments’ and Section 12 ‘Other Financial Instruments Issues’ of FRS 102 to all of its financial instruments.
Financial instruments are recognised in the charity's balance sheet when the charity becomes party to the contractual provisions of the instrument.
Financial assets and liabilities are offset, with the net amounts presented in the financial statements, when there is a legally enforceable right to set off the recognised amounts and there is an intention to settle on a net basis or to realise the asset and settle the liability simultaneously.
Basic financial assets, which include debtors and cash and bank balances, are initially measured at transaction price including transaction costs and are subsequently carried at amortised cost using the effective interest method unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the transaction is measured at the present value of the future receipts discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial assets classified as receivable within one year are not amortised.
Basic financial liabilities, including creditors and bank loans are initially recognised at transaction price unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the debt instrument is measured at the present value of the future payments discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial liabilities classified as payable within one year are not amortised.
Debt instruments are subsequently carried at amortised cost, using the effective interest rate method.
Trade creditors are obligations to pay for goods or services that have been acquired in the ordinary course of operations from suppliers. Amounts payable are classified as current liabilities if payment is due within one year or less. If not, they are presented as non-current liabilities. Trade creditors are recognised initially at transaction price and subsequently measured at amortised cost using the effective interest method.
Financial liabilities are derecognised when the charity’s contractual obligations expire or are discharged or cancelled.
The cost of any unused holiday entitlement is recognised in the period in which the employee’s services are received.
Payments to defined contribution retirement benefit schemes are charged as an expense as they fall due.
Grants receivable
Total
Total
Event and project costs
Training and wellbeing
Travel expenses
Website and computer costs
Bookkeeping and payroll
Sundry expenses
Rent
Insurance
Website and computer costs
Telephone and internet
Printing, postage and stationery
Bank charges
All costs were apportioned on a direct basis.
Governance costs includes payments to the auditors of £7,440 (2024- £7,200) for audit fees.
The average monthly number of employees during the year was:
The charity considers that the Trustees including the Executive Director are its key management personnel.
Under the governing document of the charity Pete Ritchie is a remunerated trustee. The total employment benefits including employer pension and employer NI contributions of key management personnel were £70,322 (2024 - £67,525).
No employee earned more than £60,000 per annum during the year nor in the previous year,
The charity is exempt from taxation on its activities because all its income is applied for charitable purposes.
The charity operates a defined contribution pension scheme for all qualifying employees. The assets of the scheme are held separately from those of the charity in an independently administered fund.
The restricted funds of the charity comprise the unexpended balances of donations and grants held on trust subject to specific conditions by donors as to how they may be used.
Bridging the Gap
Partnership project, led by Sustain, exploring innovative ways to make organic fruit and veg more accessible to low income households.
Organic Stakeholders Group
Funding for the ongoing support and convening of the Scottish Organic Stakeholders Group.
Good Food Nation Living Lab
Partnership project, led by the University of Edinburgh, supporting the practical implementation of the Good Food Nation Act at the local authority and health board level.
Dignity in Practice
Project supporting peer learning amongst food pantries and community food meals, focused on enhancing dignity, and hosting the Dignity in Practice network.
South Asia Nitrogen Hub
SANH is a partnership under the UK Global Challenge Research Fund bringing together 32 partners from the UK and South Asia, researching how to improve nitrogen management, particularly in agriculture.
Public Diners
Project exploring the history, contemporary relevance and international examples of state-supported restaurants
Scottish Food Coalition
Funding from partners in the Scottish Food Coalition to support Coalition's activities.
Our Right to Food
Project working with a group of community advisors exploring what the right to food looks like in practice for Pakistani households in Scotland.
Meaningful Participation Panel
Funding to support the work of a panel of experts by experience focusing on meaningful participation in policymaking.
Fish+ Conference
Funding for a one-day conference, bringing together stakeholders from academia, industry, NGOs and public procurement to develop a common vision for aquatic foods in the Good Food Nation.
Sustainable Food Places
Partnership project supporting a network of Sustainable Food Places in Scotland, and at the UK level.
Veg in Nurseries
Project piloting a new way of introducing seasonal, local veg into pre-school curriculum.
Farming the Future
Funding to develop the work of Scottish Agroecology Partnership.
Glasshouses
Funding to support a glasshouse feasibility study in Dundee.
Fish+ Panel
Grant from Esmee Fairbairn to support consensus building amongst diverse stakeholders on the future of aquatic foods in the context of the Good Food Nation.
Peas Please
UK-wide Peas Please is a partnership project bringing together farmers, retailers, caterers, manufacturers, government departments, and local authorities with a common goal of making it easier for everyone to eat veg.
Dignity in Practice
Funding for hosting the Dignity in Practice network, and facilitating a series of dialogues with local authority leads and food insecurity experts by experience.
Small Producers Info Hub
Funding for the co-development of the Small Producers Info Hub with a group of small producers from across Scotland.
Glasgow Community Project
Working with a group of people who have lived experience of the asylum process to further develop the Dignity in Practice work to better reflect the needs of that demographic.
The unrestricted funds of the charity comprise the unexpended balances of donations and grants which are not subject to specific conditions by donors and grantors as to how they may be used. These include designated funds which have been set aside out of unrestricted funds by the trustees for specific purposes.
There were no disclosable related party transactions during the year (2024 - none).
The charity had no material debt during the year.