SELANGOR, MALAYSIA February 12, 2026 – The Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living (KPDN) today launched the Ihsan Food Bank Initiative (i-FB) as a new approach to drive the transformation agenda in strengthening the implementation of the Food Bank Malaysia Programme.
This transformation follows the Food Bank Malaysia Convention held from 8 to 9 December 2025. The transformation agenda outlines three main objective components of the Ihsan Food Bank Initiative: Caring for the Community (Santuni Komuniti), Loving the Environment (Sayangi Alam), and Saving Food (Selamatkan Makanan).
The i-FB initiative emphasizes efforts to promote values of compassion and mercy in society to collectively care for vulnerable groups and targeted communities by channeling food aid through food banks. This helps alleviate the people’s burden of cost of living, particularly in food expenditure.
At the same time, i-FB fosters values of compassion, awareness, and concern among the public to love the environment through controlling surplus food production that becomes solid waste. Uncontrolled increases in food waste involve costs for illegal waste disposal or the opening of more landfills, which in turn affects environmental quality. As statistics previously released by the Solid Waste and Public Cleansing Management Corporation (SWCorp), Malaysians are reported to generate an estimated 17,000 metric tonnes of food waste daily.
The i-FB initiative also focuses on instilling values of togetherness in contributing community service in the food rescue movement. This aligns with Malaysia’s commitment to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 12.3, which targets halving food waste at the industry and consumer levels by 2030. A study by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) found that one-third, equivalent to 1.3 billion metric tonnes, of food produced worldwide is wasted.
In addition, key findings from the convention include the need to implement three enablers to drive the food bank programme transformation:
i. Enhancing strategic cooperation among existing stakeholders with coordination of resources and expertise;
ii. Expanding networks of togetherness through a whole-of-nation approach by providing incentive activations;
iii. Restructuring the implementation of the food bank programme based on the latest systems and technology.
Today’s launch of the Ihsan Food Bank Initiative, held at Politeknik Sultan Idris Shah (PSIS), Sabak Bernam, Selangor, was also attended by KPDN’s strategic partners who have committed to driving the food bank programme transformation agenda. KPDN opens the space and welcomes more parties to come forward as strategic partners in the i-FB Initiative.
Ihsan Food Bank Incubator@PSIS
Today’s event also included the launch of the Ihsan Food Bank Incubator@PSIS. The Food Bank Siswa at PSIS, initially driven by the Student Consumer Movement (GPS), is one of the pioneers in implementing the Food Bank Programme introduced by KPDN starting in 2019.
The scope of Food Bank Siswa@PSIS implementation includes providing cooked and dry food through continuous daily pantry operations, delivery of food baskets to students with special needs, disaster aid especially to flood-affected students, and implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes including the Ramadan Blessing Basket Programme.
This initiative continues to be strengthened through the Ihsan Food Bank Incubator, utilizing retort technology contributed by KPDN in June 2022. Through this innovation, PSIS successfully produced safe and quality food products such as Dendeng Selambak Beef. This product is not only marketed as student entrepreneurship training but part of the sales proceeds is channeled back to support the operational fund of Food Bank Siswa@PSIS, making it a sustainable circular economy model.
Since the programme was implemented, Food Bank Siswa@PSIS has recorded a cumulative impact benefiting 27,360 recipients. This impact is also supported by active student involvement in social entrepreneurship activities that contribute directly to the sustainability of food bank operations. Based on early achievements, Politeknik Sultan Idris Shah will now become the pioneer in the food bank programme transformation agenda through the Ihsan Food Bank Initiative.
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