Poverty is a social taboo in Luxembourg. This is despite the fact that around one in five people are affected by it. The Cent Buttek redistributes surplus products from supermarkets to help people in precarious situations and, at the same time, fight food waste. A reportage.
It is a humid Tuesday morning when we visit the Cent Buttek in Bettembourg. Early in the morning, we watch as the volunteers unload the goods from the trucks in the Rue de la Gare, while the shop is being prepared for the afternoon's customers. Today, the drivers have brought numerous boxes full of dairy products, vegetables, fruit and bread from the supermarkets.
Symbolic two euros
The Bettemburg Cent Buttek has been in existence for 14 years. After it was founded in 2009, other shops were opened in Beggen in 2010 and in Petange in 2015. The Cent Buttek is a kind of social shop that receives products from various supermarkets that are no longer sold in the big shops because they are approaching their expiry date, have not been sold much or show blemishes such as bent paper. These goods are made available to people in difficult financial circumstances. At the same time, Cent Buttek fights against food waste and helps people who are at risk of social exclusion or poverty. A total of about 700 tonnes of food is collected and distributed by Cent Buttek every year. Monique Richter-Ahnen, the person in charge of the Bettemburg Cent Buttek, emphasises: "The Cent Buttek is a business that is supposed to help our customers solve their financial problems and thus live better". In Luxembourg, according to Eurostat 2021, about 18.1 percent of the population is at risk of poverty in 2021.
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