What do you get when young aspiring chefs from across western Melbourne come together? Good food, even better company and huge community benefits for years to come.
And the benefits of a new program Kitchen Culture are not just about training crack chefs to tantalize our tastebuds. They are also about providing an opportunity for young people from different cultures to get along.
Kitchen Culture is run by Melbourne Citymission’s Youth Enterprise Hub (YEH) and funded by the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation (VicHealth) as part of a program called Building Bridges to break down racial discrimination.
Melbourne City Mission’s CEO, Anne Turley says: “Kitchen Culture is an extremely exciting project, benefitting both the young people involved and their local communities.”
“Each year, more than 80 young people from western Melbourne will attend Kitchen Culture sessions, celebrating cultural diversity through working with food and discouraging discrimination.
‘We have more than 30 languages and cultures represented over the year, cooking up a delicious smorgasbord of cultural dishes for friends and families,” Ms Turley adds.
“The Kitchen Culture project is about harmony for good health,” says Todd Harper, VicHealth CEO.
VicHealth’s innovative Building Bridges program, is injecting $1.5 million directly into five major projects. This will build on the work of more than 40 community projects, already funded under a pilot VicHealth program across the State.
“There is strong support for embracing diversity,” says VicHealth CEO Todd Harper. “VicHealth data shows that nine out of ten Victorians (90%) agree it is a good for society to be made up of different cultures. Victoria has a good record of fostering cultural diversity but there are still plenty of harmful attitudes in the community.”
The new program follows evidence of strong links between racial discrimination and health, as shown in a ground-breaking VicHealth report. “The VicHealth report shows there is a clear link between racial discrimination and mental health problems, particularly depression,” Mr Harper says.
“Discrimination is also linked to cigarette smoking as well as alcohol and other drug misuse. There is emerging evidence of an association between discrimination and physical health problems such as heart disease, weight problems, diabetes and low infant birth weight,” he adds.
“Getting together over good food has long been a way of making sure we all get along. Eat and be merry,” Mr Harper concludes.