Feeding America
Poverty Crises. Feeding America is a United States organization that consists of nationwide network of more than two hundred food banks and food rescue organization that serves the United States as well as Puerto Rico. It is the nation leading hunger relief charity. In the late 1060s, John van Hengel, a retired businessman in Phoenix, began volunteering at a local soup kitchen, and began soliciting food donations for the kitchen. He ended up with far more food than the kitchen could use and when he talked to his client around that time, she told him she regularly feeds her family with food discarded from the grocery store’s garbage bins. He then got an idea where there could be a place where discarded food items could be stored so that people who need it could be able to access it. Van Hengel began to actively solicit this unwanted food from the grocery stores, local gardens, and nearby produce farms. His effort led to the creation of St. Mary’s Food Bank in Phoenix, the nation’s first food bank. In 1975, St. Mary’s was given a federal grant to assist in developing food banks across the nation. This effort was formally incorporated into a separate non-profit organization. In September 2008, the organization name was changed to feeding America which conveyed the mission of the organization which was to provide food for Americans living in hunger. Hunger is more than the production of food and meeting demands of people. The problem is that hungry people are trapped in severe poverty. They lack the money to buy enough food to nourish them. Being constantly malnourished, they become weaker and often sick. This makes them increasingly less able to work, which then makes them even poorer and hungrier. This often continues until death for them and their families. Poverty is therefore directly related to hunger. Food production in most cases is usually very high but the distribution of food is very low causing a lot of food to go to waste because the food simply
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