With the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health looming, food bankers have identified improved access to healthy food as a high-priority outcome, though they are only cautiously optimistic that this and other goals can be achieved. The White House conference, scheduled for sometime in September, comes more than…
Food Bank News
Blue Ridge Area Food Bank has joined a host of food banks that have dropped fees typically imposed upon pantries. Billed as shipping and handling fees or (more confusingly) as shared maintenance fees, the modest charges help to defray the costs of storing and transporting donated food. Many food banks…
The idea of rescuing surplus produce from farms and bringing it to food banks is not a new one, but it usually happens on a local level. The Farmlink Project is taking the practice national. Started in 2020 by a group of college students, Farmlink has activated a nationwide network…
The healthy food pantry that Capital Area Food Bank is helping to run at Children’s National Hospital in D.C. is a good example of the type of evolution happening throughout the nation’s food pantry networks. The pantry, open to young patients with diabetes, aims to eliminate barriers to accessing healthy…
Feeding America last month published its twelfth annual Map the Meal Gap report, revealing the entrenched nature of food insecurity in the nation’s hardest-hit counties, as well as large disparities between racial and ethnic groups when it comes to food insecurity. Breaking down food insecurity levels by county and then…
Food banks have long depended on private donations from individuals to function, and the size of those donations followed trends that were consistent for years – until Covid-19 happened. The pandemic has elevated cash donations to a new, much higher level. RKD Group, a fundraising and marketing provider, analyzed donations…
When Greater Vancouver Food Bank decided to do away with traditional food drives, it was perfectly clear about why. It proclaimed on social media and its website that up to 30% of the food it received from food drives was spoiled, damaged or unsafe to eat. In addition, it said,…
When Open Cupboard in Minnesota opened the doors of its new grocery-store style food pantry last year, the team planned to serve no more than 100 shoppers a day. Instead, they were quickly “drinking from the fire hose trying to keep up,” Executive Director Jessica Francis recalled. They opened a…
A new and dignified way to access food is debuting at Texas schools, under a pilot program being run by Houston Food Bank. The food bank is working to install refrigerated food lockers at local schools, where people will be able to pick up food they’ve ordered online through Feeding…