Food Bank News

The five major food banks of NJ wanted to build up more resilient local food systems in their state, and now are sourcing more than 50% of their produce from local farms, up from 35% previously. Here's how they did it. Community FoodBank of New Jersey, Fulfill, Food Bank of South Jersey, Mercer Street Friends, Norwescap, Mid-Atlantic Regional Cooperative, New Jersey Office of the Food Security Advocate https://lnkd.in/eCKSRQ7V

Our annual list of the Top 300 Food Banks is out. It's the only resource of its kind! https://lnkd.in/eMDePFvx

I had the great privilege of talking about Amazon's commitment to charitable grocery home deliveries — and the amazing people who make this program work — with Fast Company and Food Bank News this week. When we started this program during the pandemic, the idea was simple: if Amazon can deliver to every doorstep in America, why not use that same capability to deliver groceries to families who can’t easily reach a food bank? Five years later, we have delivered more than 60 million meals in partnership with 40+ food banks. With our announcement this week that Amazon is extending its commitment to the program through 2028, we are giving our partners the stability they need to invest for the long term and expand to serve more families. This work is a reminder that logistics isn’t just about moving packages — it’s about removing barriers. This only works because of the dedicated teams across Amazon and our partners like SF-Marin Food Bank who support this work every day, and we're just getting started! 👉 Fast Company: https://lnkd.in/gjkiyzVD 👉 Food Bank News: https://lnkd.in/gAWvGJPq

This week, the USDA is expected to issue its Household Food Security report, which is considered the gold standard for understanding whether Americans have enough food. Future reports have been canceled, so this will be the last one for the foreseeable future. In this article we talk about what might replace it, if anything. https://lnkd.in/eqJ7MYJ6

Something cool in food banking: in a recent test, Tarrant Area Food Bank used land and air drones to make home deliveries of food. https://lnkd.in/g8UDSUdN

Now that the firehose of pandemic-era support for home deliveries has retreated, food banks are exploring new ways of keeping the deliveries going, including through partnerships with healthcare providers. https://lnkd.in/e9ft-56n

Sustainable Food Story Sunday 🥕 🥗 🥔 This week’s story, “Finding Room for Capacity Building, Even When Funding is Scarce” by Chris Costanzo in Food Bank News, highlights a key challenge: most food banks are stuck focusing on immediate hunger relief, with little room (or funding) to invest in long-term growth. Capacity building, such as using better technology, training staff, or warehouse upgrades can dramatically improve food distribution. With limited, restricted funding, these critical investments often are pushed to the side. Organizations like Growing Healthy Pantries are finding creative ways to help food banks bridge this gap between short-term and long-term investments, like building a best practice toolkit that walks pantry managers through a wide range of topics. Solving hunger issues is not just about supplying food, it is about investing in the systems and people that make food access possible!

Community Farmacy, a joint health initiative between Community Harvest Food Bank of Fort Wayne, Ind., and a local healthcare facility is making an impact on public health by prescribing food, not pills. https://lnkd.in/eT7zebbc

Building up capacity in the food pantry network may not be the first strategy that comes to mind when federal funding is scarce and demand for food is up. But reimagining pantry partnerships may be just what this moment calls for. https://lnkd.in/e8JWn6Ex

Daily Bread Food Bank of Canada was able to score a huge policy win by doing two things -- bringing together a large coalition of nearly 70 organizations and remaining laser-focused on a single goal. More here: https://lnkd.in/gw7skPdT