The community allotments feeding families

Paula Rowcliffe set up Birches Head Get Growing to create a more sustainable and equal community

Community allotments are helping to feed people in a deprived area of Stoke-on-Trent.

The Birches Head Get Growing group runs a breakfast club twice a week at The Bridge Centre, giving away the fruit and vegetables it grows.

The system works via an exchange model, with many of those receiving the food repaying the favour by volunteering at the group's three allotments.

The founder of the project, Paula Rowcliffe, has been nominated for a BBC Make a Difference award.

Chantelle and her daughter volunteer at the breakfast club

Ms Rowcliffe, 54, said it was all about "growing a community spirit", adding that by helping people, it gave them a chance to give back.

"Once you do that, the whole thinking changes - it's a blissful mindset", she explained.

She added that with so many people struggling with the cost of living, the fresh produce was gratefully received.

The group does not accept cash donations and instead asks for people to donate their time. It currently has more than 40 volunteers.

Ms Rowcliffe said overseeing the three allotments was time consuming, with volunteers working "flat out to do what we do".

Among them is Chantelle and her two-year-old daughter, the organisation's youngest helper.

Chantelle said some of those using the service had "lost their jobs or their homes".

It was "incredible how the community just pulls together" to help them, she added.

Matthew and his son attend the breakfast club but also volunteer their time at the allotment

When Matthew first started coming to the breakfast club he said it was about "putting his life back together after a mental health crisis".

The 44-year-old said volunteering at the allotment had given him his "confidence back" and helped him get "back into work".

Describing the project, he said: "It's nice, it's kind, it's all you need really."

Nia Nita said Paula Rowcliffe had been a huge support to her when the resources were not there to support her disabled son

Nia Nita, 57, a regular at the breakfast club said: "You go to some food banks and you just get packaged stuff but here you get organic produce which is very good."

The breakfast club is just one of many projects run by Birches Head Get Growing.

It also hosts swap shops, stay and play sessions for younger children, and growers groups.

Ms Rowcliffe's efforts to make a positive change in Birches Head has resulted in her being nominated for BBC Radio Stoke's Make a Difference awards.

The winners will be revealed at a special ceremony at Vale Park, Burslem, on Friday 6 September.