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How Food Banks Went Global

New Int

“The rise of food charity in some of the most affluent countries is surely a sign that something has gone badly wrong. So why is this broken model being exported to the rest of the world?” Check out Closing The Hunger Gap in New Internationalist‘s recent article about the global rise of emergency food services. Click here for the full article.

 

 

Closing The Hunger Gap Solidarity Statement

Solidarity Statement_

 

Closing The Hunger Gap Solidarity Statement

 

At the 2015 Closing the Hunger Gap conference held in Portland, Oregon with more than 600 people representing food access organizations from all 50 states and Canada, a statement was developed and adopted that has served as a foundation for the network’s vision of a world free of hunger.

Racial injustice and privilege are at the root of economic injustice. 

Economic injustice is the root cause of hunger. 

The only way to end hunger is to end racial injustice.

Five years later as we witness and participate in the amplification of voices responding to the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and countless others, and to the ongoing violence, suppression, and brutality facing the Black community; as we witness and participate in demanding the end of state-sanctioned violence in Black communities and calling for justice and collective liberation; as we witness and participate in the mobilization of people taking to the streets in urban areas and rural townships in the U.S. and across the world; we are called to re-center our foundational statement that there will be no end to hunger without ending racial injustice.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, 37 million people in the United States were struggling to put food on their tables, with Black households in the majority and more than double the rate of white households experiencing hunger. Close to 40 million households necessarily relied on private non-profit food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens to meet their monthly household food needs, even with a majority of those households having at least one adult working full-time. Again, the vast majority of the people of color who live in poverty, do so at more than double the rate of whites. Since the beginning of March more than 40 million people have applied for unemployment benefits, sending organizations and institutions scrambling to meet the nutritional needs of an exponential number of families — many of whom were joining the mile-long line of folks standing outside of a stadium waiting to be handed a pre-packed bag of emergency groceries; others idling in 3-mile long lines of cars creeping toward the San Antonio Food Bank or the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank in Duquesne, PA, among others.

Closing the Hunger Gap, a network of 185 food access organizations and growing, recognizes the critical and necessary work of these organizations serving the most vulnerable in their communities during these unprecedented times.  And we continue to stand by our shared analysis, especially as food insecurity is rising and deepening due to the pandemic, that private charity will not end hunger and should never be the main response.  

Hunger is a complex issue.  But it will never be eradicated without addressing the underlying interwoven structural issues of race and economic inequality.  To end hunger we must add the human right to nutritious food to the policies and practices needed to bend the moral arc of our society towards justiceThere will be no food justice without racial justice.  There will be no racial justice without economic justice.  

Closing the Hunger Gap stands in solidarity with Black communities everywhere and seeks to participate in growing an intersectional movement rooted in a culture of collaboration and learning that centers anti-racism, while decentering white dominant culture, and that builds the world we want to live in by practicing mutual aid. Specifically, we commit to growing our network and working collectively to:

      • Build a national presence to promote a collective voice of organizations and their constituents calling for food to be recognized as a human right. 
      • Support grassroots movements led by the people most impacted by the root causes of poverty and hunger. 

 

As the nation rises up to protest atrocities against Black people, here are some organizations working to advance Black food sovereignty that you can support. Click here to see the full list from Civil Eats.

Additionally, we can promote healing in Black communities by:

 

 

CTHG Launches Mini-Grant Program to Invest in Grassroots-Led Narrative Change

Closing the Hunger Gap Mini Grants Awarded

 

Closing the Hunger Gap Network Launches Mini-Grant Program to Invest in Grassroots-Led Narrative Change
Six mini-grants awarded to fuel hunger solutions by changing the dominant narrative

Closing the Hunger Gap – a national network working to expand hunger relief efforts beyond food distribution towards strategies that promote social justice and address the root causes of hunger – announced today its first ever grant program to support grassroots-led narrative change work. The pilot program awarded six mini-grants of $5,000 each to grassroots organizations and collectives across the country working to shift the dominate narrative that food charity will end hunger to one that calls for social justice and address the root causes of hunger.

 

“It is critical that we find ways to uplift and fund the community-based and grassroots-led efforts across our country to engage in shaping a new narrative around the true solutions to hunger. We will never be able to end the decades old scourge of hunger unless we reframe the problem as inequity, injustice, poverty and racism, as opposed to simply one of food access, and attack those root causes head on,” said Natalie Jayroe, President and CEO of the Second Harvest Food Bank of Greater New Orleans and Acadiana and member of Closing the Hunger Gap’s Narrative Change Strategic Working Group.

 

The Closing the Hunger Gap Mini-grants for Narrative Change Program was launched to fund and support narrative change processes, campaigns and projects undertaken by grassroots, community-based and frontline organizations or collectives. This year’s awardees include: Community to Community Development in Bellingham, WA; Delta Fresh Foods Initiative Inc. in Bolivar Country, MS; Des Moines Area Religious Council in Des Moines, IA; The Pittsburgh Food Policy Council in Pittsburgh, PA; The SouthWest Organizing Project in Albuquerque, NM; and The Wombyn’s Wellness Garden in Portland, OR.

 

Each community-led project addresses one or more aspects of the dominant narrative around hunger and poverty and works to transform that narrative to better reflect the vision, realities and solutions to hunger that each community is building. These projects bring to light the idea of moving people from what is now the commonly accepted model of food charity as the solution to hunger, to a model of social justice that addresses the root causes of hunger. The funding will create opportunities to give communities a space for conversation and storytelling in the attempt to elevate alternative ideas and solutions to ending hunger. These projects range from an arts-based approach to shifting how farmworkers are viewed and valued, to storytelling, advocacy and community organizing led-by those most impacted by hunger and poverty, to training for urban Native women and community in growing Indigenous heritage produce and preserving medicinal/culinary herbs, seed saving and more.

 

“We are beyond grateful to be receiving the Narrative Change grant funds! Being able to provide adequate harvesting and preserving systems for the urban Native community we serve is essential. Making the process from seed to table tangible and accessible with weekly gatherings,” said Roberta Eaglehorse-Ortiz (Oglala Lakota/Yomba Shoshone) of The Wombyns Wellness Garden, LLC. “Not only do we hope to offer a great experience with food sovereignty movements, but we also hope to spark a love for farming for families and help them reclaim their connection with agriculture.”

 

To learn more about Closing the Hunger Gap, visit thehungergap.org.

 

Media Contact:
Debbie DePoala, WhyHunger
[email protected]
212-629-0853

About Closing the Hunger Gap
Closing the Hunger Gap is a network of organizations and individuals working to expand hunger relief efforts beyond food distribution towards strategies that promote social justice and address the root causes of hunger. We envision a time when all people can determine their own futures; when nutritious food is recognized as a human right; and when there is a political will to end hunger and its root causes. We envision ourselves as part of a growing, national network of collaborators and learners that engage with and support movements led by the people most impacted by hunger and poverty Learn more at https://thehungergap.org/ 

Learn more about the grantees at: 

Community to Community Development
http://www.foodjustice.org/
Facebook: @Community2Community

Delta Fresh Foods Initiative Inc.
http://www.deltafreshfoods.org/
Facebook: @deltafreshfoods

Des Moines Area Religious Council
https://www.dmarcunited.org/
Facebook: @DesMoinesARC, Twitter: @DMARCunited

The Pittsburgh Food Policy Council
https://www.pittsburghfoodpolicy.org/
Facebook: @PittsburghFoodPolicyCouncil, Twitter: @BurghFoodPolicy

The SouthWest Organizing Project
http://abqpeaceandjustice.org/
Facebook: @abqpeaceandjustice, Twitter: @ABQPeaceJustice

The Wombyn’s Wellness Garden
https://www.wombynswellnessgarden.com/
Facebook: @Wombyn’s Wellness Garden-OITBC

Webinar: Applying a Racial Equity Lens to Policies, Advocacy, and Service Provision to End Hunger

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Available now! Watch the recording of Learning “HOW” to Apply a Racial Equity to Policies, Advocacy, Programs and Service Provision to End Hunger, co-hosted by Closing the Hunger Gap and Bread for the World, featuring Marlysa D. Gambin. Ms. Gambin, lead author on the report, Applying Racial Equity to U.S. Federal Nutrition Assistance Programs: SNAP, WIC and Child Nutrition by Bread for the World, walks listeners through how structural racism makes people of color more likely to experience hunger or poverty.  She also discusses how anti-hunger organizations can apply a racial equity lens to begin to dismantle embedded structures of racial inequity.

 

Looking for more? Check out these resources on understanding and applying a racial equity lens to your work:

“Big Hunger” webinar recording now available

Big Hunger Webinar

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