A community group is set to donate food hampers to 1,500 families across the Island as part of a 16-year tradition.Andrew Phillips, of the West End East End Central Community, said yesterday that the list of needy families across the Island has grown as the economy remains weak but so has the list of volunteers.“We are not a church group or a government group, we are the community,” Mr Phillips said.He said that while other organisations play an important role in helping those less fortunate, the community group prides itself in helping anyone who needs it.“We serve everybody that needs food,” he said. “We cover the hard-core, the less pleasant parts of society, or people who are under-the-law. We have a lot of immigrants that we feed.“Some of them, a lot of them actually, do not choose to be on church lists or government lists.”He recalled in a past year, a church had sent out numerous hampers with a brochure that advertised the church.“We don’t do that,” he said. “Our motivation is transparent. We just want to help people who need it.“We recently received a call from the Salvation Army asking for a copy of our list so that they could avoid duplication, which I appreciate, but the people on our list said they didn’t want to be on other lists.“I understand the Salvation Army wanting to avoid duplication, but our goal is to provide more food for those who cannot afford it. As long as there is no duplication on our list, we don’t have much concern.”Mr Phillips said that this year, several of their past sponsors were unable to make donations due to the difficult economic climate, but that others were able to donate more to make up for the difference.Lorette Simmons, who helped to organise the first food drive as part of the Somerset Trojan’s Majorettes in 1995, said that from the start of the programme one of the goals was to encourage young people to give back.Among those who have donated their time are thousands of students from more than ten schools around the Island.“This is not just for someone to win a Queen’s Award, it’s about the youth getting self respect, for them to give back to the community,” she said. “To get community service hours and to help someone else.”Over the years as the operation grew in scale, she said organisers learned to cater better to the needy, arraigning special hampers for the elderly or those who have different dietary needs.Now, the programme has grown so large they have had to obtain a warehouse in Dockyard for the food donated for their three annual food drives.