Saturday, October 11, 2014

Guide to Help your Local Food Bank this Harvest

Guide to Help your Local Food Bank this Harvest #AgProvides #SpoonSalute
Food banks across the United States are in need for donations all year long.  As my family and I bring in this year's harvest, I can't help but think about the need for healthy, affordable and quality food for the plates of all Americans.  Even though farmers work hard everyday to provide that for Americans, hunger is still an issue.  I am fortunate and have not had to struggle with hunger myself.  There were times growing up in the 80's during the farm crisis my family had to literally save our pennies to buy a gallon of milk, but we survived.  So what can we all do to help our local food banks?
  • The first and obvious choice is to make a monetary donation.  I know that our local food bank uses cash donations to buy certificates to the local grocery store to pass out to those that use the food bank, so they can buy perishable items like milk and eggs.  They also use these type of donations to help them get whatever they are in need of.
  • The second and also obvious choice is to make a donation of nonperishable food items to your local food bank.  Our local food bank suggests items such as canned tuna or chicken, canned fruits and vegetables, peanut butter, juice, rice, soup, crackers, tortillas, spaghetti sauce, and oatmeal.
  • A third idea is to make a "spicy" donation.  Think about it, people that rely on the food bank for food staples such as mentioned above also need and want things like spices and chocolate to spruce up those items.  And yes, even though we don't need chocolate, don't we all appreciate being able to bake a pan of brownies for time to time.
  • A fourth idea is to make a donation of some non-food items.  In fact one of our local churches has a donation center for items such as feminine prouducts, toiletries, baby toiletries and socks.  Some of these items food stamps don't cover.
  • Fifth, get out and volunteer.  Most food banks are largely volunteer ran and are always looking for help.  If you can't commit to a shift at your local food bank, think about starting your own food drive in your local neighborhood, through your church, or through your workplace.
  • Sixth, you can help out local food banks through social media!  One of our local food banks, Hawkeye Harvest Food Bank, can be helped by commenting on the blog, It's Just Life, this month.  Beth Ann at It's Just Life is actually the one who inspired me to create a Comments for a Cause program on my blog.  Go check out her blog and support her efforts!  Also, Farm Credit Services of America is donating $5 to local food banks when you use the hashtag #SpoonSalute.  So get to tweeting!
So, what are you going to do to support your local food bank this harvest?  Or what other ideas do you have to share?  Remember to Comment for a Cause!

31 days from a Tractor Seat

(This post is a part of a 31 Days from a Tractor Seat series.  The best way to keep up with this series is to follow via email on the right sidebar of this post or by following on Bloglovin.  Also be sure to like the Corn, Beans, Pigs and Kids Facebook page for daily updates from the field.)

4 comments:

  1. Great post, Val!!! So many great suggestions and so true---we have no idea about how many choices people have to make between buying food and other things. In our area it seems that the food bank gets a real work out. I actually visited the new facility (Hawkeye Harvest) this week and it is an amazing facility with so much more space and ability to keep produce and cold items much better than before. So happy to be a tiny part of helping them out this month and hope everyone hops over to It's Just Life to comment. Thanks!

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    1. That is great that they have space for produce and cold items! Thanks for your help!

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