Long lines have returned to food banks across the United States as inflation-stricken Americans turn to grants to help feed their families.
With gas prices rising along with grocery costs, many people are looking for charity food for the first time, and are arriving more on foot.
Inflation in the United States is at its highest level in 40 years and gas prices have been rising since April 2020, with the nationwide average cost hitting briefly at $ 5 a gallon in June. The rapidly rising rents and the end of the federal release from COVID-19 also took financial effect.
Food banks, which had begun to see some relief as people returned to work after a pandemic shutdown, are struggling to meet the latter need even as federal programs provide less food to distribute, the grocery donations are declining and cash gifts are not going up as much. away.
Tomasina John was among hundreds of families stranded in various car lanes that circled the block a recent day outside the St. Mary’s Food Bank in Phoenix. John said her family had never visited a food bank before because her husband had easily supported her and their four children in his construction work.
“But it’s really impossible to get there by now without some help,” said John, who traveled with a neighbor to share gas costs while they were caught under a stealing desert sun. “Prices are too high.”
Jesus Pascual was also in the queue.
“It’s a real struggle,” said Pascual, a curtain maker who estimates he spends several hundred dollars a month on groceries for himself, his wife and their five children between the ages of 11 and 19. .
The same scene is repeated across the nation, with food bank workers predicting a tough summer to keep up with demand.
The rise in food prices comes after state governments ended COVID-19 disaster declarations that temporarily allowed for increased benefits under SNAP, the federal food stamp program that covers about 40 million Americans. .
“It doesn’t look like it will improve overnight,” said Katie Fitzgerald, president and chief operating officer for the national food banking network Feeding America. “Demand is really making complex supply challenges.”
The distribution of food to charity remained much higher than the amounts donated before the coronavirus pandemic, although demand declined somewhat late last year.
Feding America officials say second-quarter data won’t be ready until August, but they are hearing anecdotally from food banks across the country that demand is rising.
Phoenix Food Bank’s main distribution center dod out food packages to 4,271 families during the third week of June, a 78% increase over the 2,396 families served during the same week of June. last year, said St. Mary’s spokesman Jerry Brown.
More than 900 families gather at the distribution center each day of the week for an emergency government food box filled with items such as canned beans, peanut butter and rice, Brown said. Santa Maria adds products purchased with cash donations, as well as food provided by local supermarkets such as bread, carrots and pork chops for a combined package worth about $ 75.
Distribution by the Alameda County Community Food Bank in Northern California has increased since hitting the lowest pandemic level earlier this year, and has risen from 890 families served in the third week of January for 1,410 families in the third week of June, said the director of marketing. Michael Altfest.
At Houston Food Bank, the largest food bank in the United States where food distribution levels earlier in the pandemic briefly peaked at a staggering one million pounds a day, it is now averaged of 610,000 pounds per day.
This is higher than about 500,000 pounds a day before the pandemic, spokeswoman Paula Murphy said.
Murphy said cash donations have not declined, but inflation ensures they don’t go away.
Food bank executives said the sharp rise in demand caught them off guard.
“Last year, we were expecting a decline in demand for 2022 as the economy was doing well,” said Michael Flood, CEO of Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. “This issue with inflation started pretty suddenly.”
“A lot of these are people who are working and doing well during the pandemic and maybe even saw their wages rise,” Flood said. “But they have also seen food prices rise beyond their budgets.”
The Los Angeles bank gave about 30 million pounds of food during the first quarter of this year, slightly less than the previous quarter but still well over the 22 million pounds given during the first quarter. of 2020.
Feeding America’s Fitzgerald is calling on the USDA and Congress to find a way to restore hundreds of millions of dollars of recently lost commodities with the end of several temporary programs to provide food to people in need. USDA commodities, which can generally account for up to 30% of food distributed by banks, accounted for more than 40% of all food distributed in fiscal year 2021 by the Feeding America network.
“There is a critical need for the public sector to buy more food now,” Fitzgerald said.
During the Trump administration, the USDA bought billions of dollars in pork, apples, milk, potatoes and other products in a program that gave most of it to food banks. The “Food Purchase & Distribution Program” designed to help U.S. farmers affected by tariffs and other practices of U.S. trading partners has since ended. There were $ 1.2 billion authorized for fiscal year 2019 and another $ 1.4 billion authorized for fiscal 2020.
Another temporary USDA “Farmers for Families” program that provided emergency assistance provided more than 155 million boxes of food for families in need across the United States during the height of the pandemic before it ended in May 31, 2021.
A USDA spokesman noted that the agency is using $ 400 million from the Build Better Back initiative to establish agreements with tribal states, territories and governments to purchase food from local, regional and unattended producers that can be donated to local banks. food, schools and other feeding programs.
For now, there is enough food, but it may not be there in the future, said Michael G. Manning, president and CEO of Greater Baton Rouge Food Bank in Louisiana. He said the high fuel costs also make it much more expensive to collect and distribute food.
The USDA’s Coronavirus Food Assistance Program, which included Farmers for Families, was a “blessing” for the Alameda County Community Food Bank, which provided £ 5 billion in products. over one year, the Altfest spokesman said.
“So losing that was a huge success,” he said.
Altfest said as many as 10% of people now looking for food are first-timers, and a growing number are seen on foot rather than by cars to save gas.
“The food they take from us is helping them save already stretched budgets for other expenses like gas, rent, diapers and infant formula,” he said.
Meanwhile, food purchases by the bank have jumped from a monthly average of $ 250,000 before the pandemic to $ 1.5 million now due to food prices. Rising gasoline costs have forced the bank to increase its fuel budget by 66%, Altfest said.
Supply chain issues are also a problem, requiring the food bank to become more aggressive with procurement.
“We were re-ordering when our inventory went down for three weeks, now we’re re-ordering for up to six weeks,” Altfest said.
He said the food bank has already ordered and paid for the whole chicken, stuffing, cranberries and other holiday party items it will distribute for Thanksgiving, the busiest time of the year.
At the Mexican American Opportunity Foundation in Montebello, east of Los Angeles, workers say they are seeing many families along with elderly people like Diane Martinez, who some morning recently lined up to walk.
Some of the hundreds of Spanish-speaking recipients had cars parked nearby. They carried cloth bags, cardboard boxes or pushcarts to collect their food packages from the distribution site serving the Los Angeles bank.
“Food prices are so high and rising every day,” said Martinez, who expressed gratitude for the bags of black beans, ground beef and other groceries. “I’m glad they were able to help us.”
