Dl6—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, November 21,1981
Putting throw-away
food in bank
When I first learned about a food
bank feasibility study for
Delaware, I must admit 1 wasn’t
all that excited.
First off, I didn’t know much
about it. And what 1 did know left
me wondering about the need and
how it might be met.
But someone was nice enough to
invite me to the first meeting of an
advisory council for the study, so I
went. And as they say in the song, I
came away with a differnet point
of view.
The whole concept has to do with
making food, that might otherwise
be wasted, available to people who
need it. It’s a self-help effort,
Talk to the man who knows
BNC-V
cnmXSL GRUMELLI’S ROY 0. CHRISTMAN
EQUIPMENT INC. FARM SERVICE RD i
ffr> o Mechanics Grove Hamburg, PA 19526
Oley, PA 19547 Quarryville, PA 57566 Ph (215) 562-7218
Ph.(215)987-6277 Ph (717)786 7318
CECIL DAIRY '
SERVICE LLOYD E. KREIDER criVi pn "
RDI Rt 274 RDI OIRLL UU.
V 4 Mi. South Rising Cochranville, PA 523 Willow Rd
Sun. MD 21911 19330 Lancaster, PA 17601
Ph.(301)658-6923 Ph (215)932-4700 Ph (717)299-2536
Farm
Talk
Jerry Webb
operated without a dime of
government money. And, in those
communities where it’s already in
place, it appears to be doing a
whale of a job.
For instance, a food bank located
in Baltimore distributes 150,000
pounds of food each month. Food
that would otherwise be thrown
away. And even though that food
bank is m its infancy, it’s already
helping more than 6,000 people
daily.
The food comes from
manufactures, distributors,
retailers, processors, even far
mers who throw away thousands of
pounds of food daily in the form of
(K 3
dented cans, broken cases, and
otherwide damaged but useable
food. Before the Maryland food
bank came along, this kind of food
was just thrown away. But now it’s
picked up, inspected, cleaned up,
and made useable. Then it's
distributed to charitable agencies
throughout Maryland.
Ann Miller, who is director of the
Maryland Food Bank, told, the
Delaware group how that effort got
started a few years back when it
became obvious that many people
in Jow-mcome status just weren’t
getting enough to eat. Even with
food stamps and welfare, some
people weren’t able to make ends
meet, and that meant they were
going hungry. At the same time,
she was able to discover that as
much as 20 percent of this nation’s
food supply is thrown out in
useable condition.
And so, using the food bank idea
already in place in some other
areas, she helped establish a non
profit corporation for the purpose
of finding useable food and seeing
that it is distributed to charitable
organizations who will use it in
feeding programs. Last year the
Maryland Food Bank distributed
3.7 million pounds of useable food
this way.
The food bank idea was helped
along by tax reform laws passed in
1976 that allow a manufacturer to
deduct the cost of producing
donated food, plus 50 percent of the
mark-up value. That means the
food company that gives damaged
merchandise to the food bank
receives considerable tax credit.
That was the incentive needed to
Pump
mse it’s
" Family /arming con " One time, up there, I
similes, realty a culture Peo mw thei i strip-plowing about a
pie whose farms are on the out , , forty-acre field There must
skirts of a growing town, who ' irtt ofii have been/two hundred teams
wanl ic farm, and for whom y- . 2a >< plowing that field, one behind
farming is the lie 10 Iheir ti another—all colors, all sizes,
ancestors and children ha\e to *'’**•- xR ' vi- M horses and mules, their skirls
deal wilh a strange, disruptive V just o-waving along with the
problem Can a stable hale - i motion of the double tree, as if
wat of life that is the basis for they were floating on the water
health and order in commumtv jimWß*^***- j ‘ I can get goose-pimples on me
and government be exchanged from just silting there thinking
for mnnev* about it ”
" I feel a band between us and a dependence on each
other, and I know I have a horse I can be proud of ”
The
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keep them from just loading it on a
truck and hauling it to the dump.
It may sound like some food
companies don’t know what
they’re dome if they’re throwing
of useable food, but you must
realize that in today's palatized,
fork-lift society, a food wholesaler
or processor can’t deal very ef
fectively with broken boxes,
dented cans, peeling labels, and all >
of the other malforauties' that
befall a percentage of the mer
chandise in this big-volume
business.
It’s a lot of tonnage and it helps
feed a lot of people, but it’s a small
share of the business. With the tax
law and the appeal of the food
bank, those firms are now setting
aside that damaged merchandise,
and in some cases actually
delivering it to the food bank
warehouse.
One major retailing chain in the
Baltimore area currently provides
approximately 16,000 pounds of
food each week to the bank. Others
provide lesser supplies. And it’s
everything from Twinkles to
watermelons, from spaghetti
sauce to canned pears, from ice
cream to rye bread. Good useable
food that is inventoried and made
available through reputable,
charitable agencies that are
working to feed hungry people.
As mentioned earlier, the food
bank operated without government
money. In fact, it’s self-supporting,
by charging a flat rate of nme
cents a pound to the agencies who
draw food from its shelves. Three
hundred and fifteen of these
agencies ranging from store-front
churches to some of the more well
known charitable organizations,
shop there.
It was a surprise to me that such
a volume of food is available. In
fact, MUler said warehouse space
is always a problem. Sometimes
they have to turn away large
donations because they just don’t
have room.
So, is the same situationtrue in
-Delaware? Are there companies
who would donate food and are
there agencies who would use such
a service.? Well that’s what the
food bank feasibility study was all
about. Patricia Knodel, who is
project manager for the study,
assembled a group of citizens with
varied interests in food production
and food utilization. They’ve been
asking a lot of questions, trying to
find out if food might be made
available to the many agencies in
Delaware who are operatmg
feeding programs. They’ve talked
with food processors, distributors,
retailers, farmers, governmental
agency people, charitable
organizations, and others to fmd
out if Delaware could support such
an effort and if it’s truly needed.
With that sort of background the
advisory group has approved the
project. Now a lot of ground work
must be done to make the food
bank work.
Who will benefit from this effort?
Hungry people. Those who,
because of circumstances, are
unable to get adequate food at
home. This would be through
community centers, senior cen
ters, day care centers, shelters,
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