Food Bank Distributes 3 million pounds of food

There’s a word of thanks in the latest newsletter from Peter Werbecki and the Food Bank of central and eastern NC:

Thanks to you, we’ve been able to make a tremendous impact in our communities.  In December alone, we distributed over three million pounds of food!  That’s equivalent to over 130,000 meals per day to struggling families, children, individuals and seniors throughout our 34-county service territory.  What a wonderful feeling to know that so many people who would have gone hungry have had nutritious, hot meals to sustain them during the holidays!

We have some exciting events coming up that will continue the spirit of giving. Currently, in partnership with the popular television show “The Biggest Loser”, we’re featuring The Pound for Pound Challenge – for every pound America loses, a pound of food will be donated.  Canstruction (giant sculptures made of cans) is on display at Marbles Kids Museum and serves as a drop-off point for food donations until February 14.  Twitter for Food (skip lunch and use the savings to support the Food Bank) is coming up on February 2 and the “Give A Day, Get A Disney Day” volunteer program is ongoing until December 15.  Details of these events and more can be found on our Special Events Page.

Hungry Americans

New data released by the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) reveal for the very first time the extent to which Americans are struggling to afford enough food in every Congressional District and 100 of the country’s largest metropolitan areas. The data chronicles food hardship through December 2009, providing a unique up-to-date examination of how millions of American households in every part of the country are struggling with hunger in the recession.

• In 2009, in 20 states, more than one in five respondents said that they experienced food hardship; in 45 states more than 15 percent reported food hardship. For households with children, in 22 states one quarter or more of respondents reported food hardship.
• Of the 100 largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs), 82 had 15 percent or more of respondents answering that they did not have enough money to buy needed food at times in the last 12 months. For the 50 largest MSAs, 15 had more than one in four households with children reporting food hardship.

Download the report: Food Hardship: A Closer Look at Hunger – Data for the Nation, States, 100 MSAs, and Every Congressional District (pdf)

Families Struggle to Afford Food, Survey Finds - NY Times

Big Ag and world hunger

At the Atlantic magazine, Josh Viertel in the article “Why Big Ag won’t feed the world” writes that hunger is not a global production problem; it is a global justice problem.

Marion Nestle’s Top 10 for 2010

Marion Nestle has come up with a Top 10 list for nutrition issues for 2010 on her Food Politics blog that includes hunger and obesity.

LA Times: State has erected barriers to help hungry

In the editorial “Hunger in California,” the Los Angeles Times notes California is a bad place to be hungry.

Feeding programs seek cash, not cans

New York Times reporter Susan Dominus in the article “To feed the hungry; Keep the can, open a wallet” writes that food drives are an annual holiday tradition, as ubiquitous as eggnog but, it turns out, about as welcome in some corners as fruitcake.

Millions added to food stamps rolls

In the Christian Science Monitor patchwork blog, Dante Chinni writes in the article “Where the biggest jumps in food stamps have been” that food stamp rolls have grown by more than 10 million during the past two years. Chinni charts the data for you.

Food Stamp Usage Across the Country – NY Times – US data mapped by county

CBS News: America is land of the hungry

CBS News reporter Barry Peterson in the article “Fighting hunger in a land of plenty” notes that while its been a good year for crop yields, its been a record year for hunger in the US.

Triangle food insecurity

NC Policy Watch’s Clayton Henkel interviewed Jill Staton Bullard and Jason Boone of the Interfaith Food Shuttle about the recent increase in food insecurity in the Greater Triangle. You can listen to the interview here.

Joel Berg: How Hungry is America?

In his 2008 book “All You Can Eat: How Hungry is America?” Executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger Joel Berg spotlights domestic poverty and hunger. Berg reveals how consistently the federal government has ignored the fact that 35.5 million Americans, including 12.6 million children, don’t have enough to eat.

While serving 8 years in the USDA in the Clinton Administration, Berg helped establish a National Government initiative to enable faith-based and other nonprofit groups fight hunger, and increase food security.

You can hear more from him in this Cooking Up a Story video.