Introduction:

Achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG 2.1) ensuring access to healthy and nutritious food by all, is a challenge in providing access to fruits and vegetables. Soup kitchens, which rely heavily on food donations, can improve dietary quality among beneficiaries through the redistribution of fruits and vegetables.

Objective:

To evaluate fruit and vegetable (FV) consumption among soup kitchen beneficiaries, considering their sociodemographic characteristics and the frequency of fruit and vegetable donations to these kitchens.

Materials and methods:

Observational cross-sectional study. Participants were 87 soup kitchen beneficiaries aged ≥18 years from the Metropolitan Region, Chile. We conducted a face-to-face survey to collect sociodemographic and anthropometric data and a food frequency questionnaire. Soup kitchens were categorised as receiving scheduled (SD) and non-scheduled donations (NSD) based on donation frequency. The Mann-Whitney U test compared FV servings/day, and logistic regressions were used to estimate compliance with the 5-a-day FV consumption recommendation based on sociodemographic and anthropometric factors.

Results:

Only 29% met the 5-a-day FV recommendation, with no significant difference in FV servings between SD or NSD soup kitchen beneficiaries (3 vs. 2 servings/day; p=0.32). Compliance varied according to sex, age, and income, but not by donation frequency type.

Conclusions:

Sociodemographic characteristics primarily influenced fruit and vegetable consumption differences among beneficiaries. Interventions should address social determinants to improve physical and economic access, complementing ongoing food redistribution efforts. This research provides valuable insights for policymakers seeking to enhance dietary quality through sustainable food waste management.