With rising inflation, supply chain issues, and declining federal aid putting intense pressure on hunger relief organizations, a growing number of them are strategizing about ways to keep the food flowing amidst heightened demand.
From large food banks to small pantries, hunger relief experts are reporting a “perfect storm” of events that is both ratcheting up the demand for food while also crimping supply. A post-Covid pullback of federal aid in all its forms – from TEFAP to direct aid to individuals – means the current situation is more alarming for many than it was even during the height of the pandemic.
UPDATE: The same day that Food Bank News posted this article, the USDA announced that it is making $943 million in additional funding available to emergency food providers through the USDA’s Commodity Credit Corp. (a government entity created during the Depression in part to stabilize farm income and prices). An additional $500 million in aid will go the existing Local Food Purchase Assistance program, which supports local food purchases for emergency food systems, and another $500 million will go to school lunch and breakfast programs. Food banks will be able to place orders for food beginning in fiscal year 2023, and will receive deliveries throughout fiscal years 2023 and 2024.
“I’ve been in food banking since 1998 and I’ve never seen the challenges that we’re having now,” said Julie Chase-Morefield, President and CEO of Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio. “Usually, it’s just one thing.”
The current pressure points include inflation, which reached a 40-year high of 8.5% for the 12 months ending July 2022, up from only 1.2% in 2020. Inflation is combining with supply chain squeezes to dampen the purchasing power of both food banks and clients, while also spiking gas and transportation costs.
Meanwhile, government aid is not kicking in the way it did during the pandemic. Direct aid to individuals – via tax credits, extra SNAP payments and free school meals for all, for example, – has either gone away or is about to. Aid to food banks in the form of TEFAP is also down precipitously. The Fla.-based independent food bank Farm Share estimates the amount of TEFAP food nationwide will drop by 340% by the end of 2022, compared to its 2020 peak.
For many organizations, these basic supply and demand metrics just do not add up. “We’re below where we were pre-pandemic in terms of TEFAP, but there are 35% more people coming,” said Chase-Morefield. “The math does not work out.”
Food banks are responding as best they can by pursuing a number of strategies, including calling upon government agencies for help, building up pathways for increased produce distribution, expanding relationships with grocer-donors, and ramping up fundraising efforts.
Farm Share, which is experiencing a 200% increase in demand for food compared to pre-pandemic levels, issued a letter in late August to its Florida Congressional delegates, urging them to appeal to their federal counterparts to provide supplemental TEFAP for food banks in Florida and nationwide. “Congress is the only entity that can step in immediately to get all food banks through this time,” said Stephen Shelley, CEO of Farm Share, in an interview. He noted that Congress could increase TEFAP allocations via the farm bill, which is up for renewal in 2023, but such increases wouldn’t go into effect until 2024. “That’s way too long to address issues that are happening here and now,” he said.
The Ohio Association of Food Banks is petitioning its state government to release American Rescue Plan Act funds. The state’s 12 Feeding America food banks have experienced a 64% decline in USDA food since 2019, while supply chain issues have contributed to more than 275 cancelled loads of food over the past six months, the association said. It is requesting an immediate infusion of $50 million to purchase “desperately needed” food, as well as an additional $133 million to build capacity over the long term.
For many food banks, produce has emerged as a bright spot in the quest for more food. “We’re putting a lot more focus on purchasing produce,” said Anne Readhimer, Vice President of Community Impact at North Texas Food Bank, noting, “It’s a lot more affordable than dry staples.” Chase-Morefield of Ohio agreed. “Produce is the most effective way for us to spend our dollars,” she said, noting that packaged food is usually priced at about 70 to 80 cents a pound, while produce is about half that.
Because they’re willing to purchase less-than-perfect produce, food banks are not competing against retail grocers for the same produce supply. In a sense, “produce is just out there in the open,” Readhimer said, and is increasingly available through organizations like Texas’ Collaborative for Fresh Produce, one of seven Feeding America-supported initiatives that works directly with growers to source fresh produce that would otherwise go to waste. North Texas Food Bank is also looking forward to the USDA’s Local Food Purchase Assistance program to kick in, which would provide funding to develop additional relationships with local farmers.
Every little bit of produce helps. St. Louis Area Food Bank recently took in nearly 3,000 pounds of produce through a relationship with a single farmer’s market. In a pilot, the farmers use a refrigerated truck from the food bank to store produce over the course of a two-day market, extending its shelf life. Any extra is then donated to the food bank, which plans to broadly expand the program, said Meredith Knopp, President and CEO of St. Louis Area Food Bank. “We have to get very creative to try to outsmart these current challenges,” she said.
Food banks are also trying to reinvigorate their relationships with grocers. North Texas Food Bank now has more transportation bandwidth to pick up donations from area grocers, compared to when it was scrambling to get emergency food out to agencies during Covid, Readhimer said. Over the last year, the Plano, Tex.-based food bank has increased its number of retail donors by 21% to 407 relationships, expanding its percentage of donated food to 59%, up from 42%.
In some cases, cash donations from the community are helping to sustain food bank operations. At Atlanta Community Food Bank, where demand in August reached near-pandemic levels, cash donations are helping to meet the need – at the moment, said Kyle Waide, President and CEO. The food bank is purchasing “a ton of food,” Waide said, even as it has expanded its roster of donating grocers by about 14%. What’s helping is fundraising levels that are approximately double what they were pre-pandemic (though they have softened from the height of the pandemic). “I feel like the floor has been raised significantly on fundraising, and that’s helping with purchasing,” Waide said. “We’re evaluating how long we can sustain this.”
Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio is also in evaluation mode. Its budget for purchased food has exploded from $600,000 in 2019 when it was 6% of total food sourced, to now $1.9 million and 36% of the total. While the food bank’s donors have been “amazing,” said Chase-Morefield, “we’re in the red on purchasing food right now. We can’t continue this way.”
While many food banks are confident that their communities will step up in response to calls for more food and cash, others are realistic that they may have to pull back. Farm Share has already cut by about half to ten the number of direct distributions it makes statewide, as it continues to focus on getting food to its nearly 2,000 agency partners. Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio is considering putting new limits on the amount of food that can be picked up or perhaps limiting people from picking up on behalf of others, Chase-Morefield said. “I fear what may have to give is the people we’re serving.” – Chris Costanzo
CAPTION, TOP: Empty shelves at Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio, posted on Twitter on August 24.
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