Dave – Volunteer

Meet Dave Persaud, a FoodCycle hosting volunteer who’s achieved ‘legendary’ status for his positivity – which helps keep everyone smiling at FoodCycle Milton Keynes Wolverton.

A retired civil servant Dave, 72, says he’s met many new friends through volunteering in his local community and enjoys volunteering with people from many different cultures.

In autumn 2026 Dave won FoodCycle’s East Regional Volunteer of the Year Award, presented in partnership with the Marsh Charitable Trust.

What does winning this award mean to you?

It means a lot to have the work that I have done for FoodCycle recognised not only by the awards committee, but by my volunteer colleagues – they’re the ones who nominated me, and I am eternally grateful to them for doing so.

I don’t do voluntary work for awards or anything like that. I do it just for the sheer pleasure of doing it. But to have my contributions recognised in this way, fills me with pride. I’m going to donate the prize money back to FoodCycle.

How long have you been volunteering with FoodCycle and what’s your role?

I’ve been with FoodCycle since February 2023 and I am on the hosting team at Wolverton in Milton Keynes. So basically I’m outside of the kitchen, helping to set up the venue for the guests arrival, setting the tables, and looking after the tea and coffee making facilities so we can provide guests with a hot drink when they arrive. Then we clear up everything after the guests have been served their food, and put everything back in place, and then we go into the kitchen and help the kitchen staff with the washing up and tidying up. I sort out the bins and the recycling too, and make sure we leave everything as we would expect to find it.

What motivated you to start volunteering with FoodCycle?

I’ve been retired for 21 years. I was fortunate enough to leave my job at the age of 51 and I decided that I still needed to do things to keep mind, body and soul occupied. So I threw myself into all things voluntary, and FoodCycle is the latest project I’ve been involved with.

One of the project leaders is a friend of mine and another friend told me that she was involved with FoodCycle too. I have helped at other food projects before, and this was another way to engage with people in the community who I’ve probably never met.

I love volunteering, it’s a good way of giving something back to the community that I have lived in for 48 years.

What do you enjoy most about volunteering with FoodCycle?

One of the primary reasons I keep returning is the volunteers who have formed a core hosting team. There are four or five of us who regularly go along, and we’ve formed a lovely little bond between us. We’ve identified where we can help things run a bit more smoothly, like I noticed if the kitchen volunteers are very busy doing all the prep and cooking, and all the pots and pans were stacking up. I saw that there was a need there, so I went in, started washing dishes for them to reuse again during the session, and that’s become a regular thing in my role.

I’m fortunate that I’m still able bodied at my age, and I enjoy the physical nature of the setting up at the tables. I also enjoy having some input when the cooks are cooking, I’ll taste the food and I’ll say if I think it needs a bit more of this or that. I do a lot of cooking at home myself anyway and it’s something I enjoy. I don’t cook at FoodCycle, there’s usually enough people doing the cooking.

The other thing that I really enjoy about our group is that we have a fairly international bunch, with people from all over the world and all walks of life. Myself, I’m from Guyana in South America, we’ve got a number of people from Hong Kong, South Africa, Mauritius, Pakistan, India, Nigeria as well, and Senegal. It’s a real multicultural place.

Do you feel you’re making a difference in the community through FoodCycle?

Absolutely. FoodCycle has a way of attracting people from within the community, not all of them necessarily lonely or elderly.

They see it as a place where they can, sit and have a decent meal and can chat with the people sat at their table. There’s a real buzz about it.

When people come along, they get so much out of it, and so do I and the other volunteers. We all love being involved in it and seeing the joy that it’s brought to so many people.

So many people have found it a way of reconnecting with other people that they haven’t seen for a while, and making new friends, as indeed I have

Has volunteering with FoodCycle made a difference in your life?

I’ve met a lot of new people who I will be friends for a long time. I have found it very rewarding to give something back to my community which I’ve lived in for 48 years. For 39 of those 48 years I was working in London, so I never got to know the community, so for the last 21 years while I’ve been volunteering, is when I’ve really found out more about my community, and how really lovely people are.

Sometimes people see me in the street and wave and say Hi Dave. It’s nice, brilliant, and gives me a warm feeling.

What would you say to encourage anyone thinking about volunteering with FoodCycle?

I would say don’t give it a second thought.  

It’s fabulous way of working with other people, making new friendships, and finding out more about food wastage, and how FoodCycle and other groups help prevent that kind of awful waste from getting into landfill. It’s a responsibility that we all have, to try and minimise food wastage on this planet.