High Food Prices Slamming Food Banks

[dollardaze]

Food Banks are finding it harder and harder to feed the hungry poor here in the U.S. The available food is disappearing before it can be ordered by the food banks, and prices can go up significantly even during the time that the food is being ordered.


Lisa Bergner, 17, right, checks the expiration date on an item to be packed into food boxes at the Mid-Ohio FoodBank. Bergner, from Bartlett, Ill., and others with the Trinity Lutheran Summer Seminary Sampler program were volunteering at the food bank.

Imagine filling your grocery cart, only to find at the checkout that prices went up 9 percent while you were shopping.

Officials at the Mid-Ohio FoodBank ran headlong into that problem May 29 as they spent $402,000 in food aid from the new federal farm bill.

By Alan Johnson



The Mid-Ohio FoodBank supplies 535 food pantries, soup kitchens and other organizations in Franklin and 19 other counties. Dawn McNichols works in the warehouse on Mound Street.

The food banks trying to feed the thousands in their areas who are in need of groceries, are certainly hitting a wall here. They only have so much to spend on the food, and have only so many places to find the food that they need to give to the people in need. It has to be very stressful for them at times. I don't think they will be seeing any relief any time soon either. The food prices are just going to continue to rise, and with the job market as low as it is, people are going to continue to need this food to feed their families.