Hotlines, text services and even navigation apps are among the tools food banks are using to better connect people to their neighborhood pantries during the pandemic. The tools go beyond the basic pantry locators typically found on many websites, and often take advantage of the accessibility mobile technology offers. In…
Food Bank News
Feeding America has made it easier for food banks in its network to take advantage of its MealConnect platform by making it automatically available in every zip code of the country. Food banks no longer have to sign up to use the service, which connects extra food from restaurants and…
When the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts took a hard look at food distribution across its four-county network a few years ago, one thing became strikingly clear: access to emergency food was not equitable, and the reason was race. The county with the largest concentration of food insecurity, poverty and…
The results of a three-year study published this spring in the Journal of Hunger and Environmental Nutrition are a reminder that even as pantries focus on distributing emergency food during the pandemic, there is value in connecting clients to social services that go beyond food. The study of 484 people…
Second Harvest Heartland of Minnesota and others are proving that a food bank does not necessarily need a kitchen to play a major role in distributing thousands of freshly prepared meals. Using Feeding America’s MealConnect platform, Second Harvest Heartland is sourcing large donations of bulk food and guiding it toward…
Under normal circumstances, the San Antonio Food Bank serves 60,000 individuals a week. At the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, this number skyrocketed to 180,000, and has since normalized at around 120,000. To meet the demand, the food bank has also been sourcing food and raising funds at a rapid…
For Steven Kullberg, Chief Operating Officer at Food Bank of the Rockies, a new government program promising over 3 million pounds of produce, milk and dairy from American farmers each month to supplement the food his organization provides to communities in northern Colorado and Wyoming was too good to pass…
The coronavirus crisis has put added pressure on SNAP, but there is some good news: greater attention is being paid to the need to make it easier for people to apply for and receive the benefit. The notoriously difficult process of applying for SNAP — involving pages of documentation and…
Ever since it merged with a restaurant serving free community meals a year and a half ago, Feeding Tampa Bay envisioned that meal preparation would be a bigger part of its future. Suddenly, that future is here. In response to the pandemic, the food bank is now coordinating the production…