AN award-winning café in Fishguard is due to close its doors on November 3, a casualty of the town’s Chimneys Link Road plans.

Transition Café, located at the entrance to the town’s Co-op store is earmarked for demolition in phase two of the Chimneys Link plan, which will go before planning on October 3.

The café, part of Transition Bro Gwaun’s surplus food project was set up in 2012-13 when it benefitted from more than £40,000 of donated materials and labour. It serves 9000 customers with good value homemade meals, snacks and drinks every year and process 11 tonnes of surplus food annually.

Staff and volunteers also make preserves with gluts of fruit and vegetables, provide catering for events and provide advice to groups and individuals about how to reduce food waste, currently through the Make a Meal of it project.

This summer the café won the Refresh, European food waste solution competition with the judges commending it for its “integrated concept, inspirational qualities and concrete action delivering quantified results”.

It also won the Wales Zone Impact category winner in the 10th annual Towns Alive Awards and the Sustainable Communities competition at the Hay Festival, both in 2014.

A survey of café customers over the last three months has shown that over a third came to Fishguard specifically to visit Transition Cafe, spending an average of £29 each in the town, this equals a total spend of £12,000 over three months.

The café has also provided volunteering, employment, work experience, and training opportunities for over 200 local people including many young and disabled people, enabling a number of them to go on to get employment.

“We can’t believe that the council would want to lose a resource which is so much around sustainability, environmental issues and helping meet the well-being targets of the local authority,” said one of the café’s founders, Chris Samra.

“We feel we have got so much more to contribute and need premises that will help us to continue the work and have a visible presence in Fishguard.
“We would love to have a presence in the town hall, which we would like to see become a real community hub in which we, and a whole range of organisations, could be located.

"It could become a more vibrant place which could be open longer and have more things going on. But we need more help to achieve this.

“Our priority is to continue making use of surplus food in a variety of ways and encourage others to do the same."

A Pembrokeshire County Council spokesman said the authority is continuing to help Transition Bro Gwaun in its search for new premises and that the Hope and Anchor and adjoining land would soon be marketed by the council.

Members of the public can comment on the planning application until September 22. Visit the planning link on the county council’s website or e-mail planning.support.team@pembrokeshire.gov.uk, quoting the planning application reference number (17/0422/PA), giving the site address and your full name and postal address.