One out of five American children are hungry. Feeding America, the country’s largest hunger relief organization with more than 200 food depositories located through America, reported that children suffer the most from hunger. “It’s never a child’s fault that they don’t have enough to eat,” Nikki Grizzle, Director of Marketing and Public Relations for the nation-wide children’s charity, Blessings in a Backpack, said, “so why should they suffer?” Children who are malnourished for an extended amount of time can suffer mental, physical and cognitive disorders, according to Ross Fraser, the Director of Media Relations at Feeding America. James Conwell, the Communications Manager of The Greater Chicago Food Depository, reported that within Cook County, one out of four children are hungry, whereas the national average is one out of five. “It’s kind of an invisible issue,” Fraser said.
Annually, nearly 678,000 people in Cook County rely on hunger relief organizations for food. According to the Greater Chicago Food Depository’s statistical analysis, approximately 37 percent of the average 142,000 people served per week are children. Nine percent of those children are under the age of five.
Food insecurity is a rising factor among Chicago children. While Fraser defined the term as “a fancy way of saying you can’t afford three meals a day,” food insecurity is precisely that: the lack of available resources to sustain a healthy diet. Inversely, “Food security” means having physical and fiscal access to appropriate amounts of alimentary foods. “The reality,” Fraser said, “is one out of seven Americans live under poverty… and that’s always astonishing.” The majority of the clients are extremely low-income families with children, he stated. “To end hunger, we first have to understand it,” Fraser said.
“Many people like to tell us that it’s the parent’s responsibility to feed the children,” Grizzle began. “Though that may be, I don’t believe that any child should go hungry because of the actions of their parents,” she continued. Blessings in a Backpack has united with three Chicago schools thus far. Specific locations and names of the schools are not released for security purposes, the charity’s website explained. Similarly, Conwell stated the Greater Chicago Food Depository believes their clients deserve to be treated with dignity. “The people we serve should be treated with the same amount of respect as everyone else,” he said. The Greater Food Depository of Chicago and Feeding America also donate to Chicago Public Schools.
Amy Satoh, the Manager of Social Policy and Research at Feeding America, believes that these families are survivors. “They know how to survive, they know how to piece it all together,” she said. Satoh conducted the organization’s hunger study, “Hunger in America,” which included statistics on food-insecurity levels in different locations in America. “According to the USDA, 17 million children are food insecure,” was one of the many statistics on childhood hunger publicized within the study.
Feeding America reported feeding roughly 6 million per year, with the Greater Chicago Food Depository feeding just less than one-sixth of that number. According to Conwell, Feeding America – an agency – and the Depository – an agency with programs – are separate entities, but work together. “The Greater Chicago Food Depository works with about 450 different agencies for about 650 programs,” Conwell reported. “So the reason for the difference is some agencies have more than one program, and some of our programs aren’t in agencies… Like our lunch buses and some of our children’s programs.” This summer, the organization will have roughly 116 children’s program, focusing on child-hunger awareness to increase local support, Conwell said.
Blessings in a Backpack, initiated in Kentucky, is an organization “with a staff of eight,” Grizzle said. The organization strives to “ Provide Weekend Nourishment to School Children on the Federal Free and Reduced Meal Program,” their website said. The program is held within public schools and can be established by basically anyone who shows an interest. Grizzle said a single school in Louisville, KY founded the first program circa 2005. “Since then,” she said,” We’ve expanded to over 42 states and 540 programs.”
Over 58,000 students have been “blessed.” Grizzled reported that close to 60,000 children are fed every weekend. “We have thousands of volunteers,” she said. Studies have shown, according to the charities website, participating students have shown marked improvement in school attendance; test scores, behavior, and – over all – health. “Blessings not only helps the students that bring the backpacks home, but it can help the whole family,” Grizzle said. Blessings in a Backpack was recently featured in People Magazine, telling the story of James and Melanie Ford, a Florida family who struggled to provide substantial meals before the charity.
Blessings in a Backpack made it clear that, “Most of these kids live in a world where some food is better than no food,” and annually have a nutritionist review their standard menu to promote “kid-friendly, nutritious, non-perishable and easy-to-prepare” meals. A typical backpack – in which was provided free of charge by the national Blessings in a Backpack, Inc. organization – consists of food such as granola bars, mac and cheese, juice and such.
Conwell reported that the Greater Chicago Food Depository prides themselves on their “strong nutritional safety net” and only distributes high quality food. Feeding America also provides healthy food, Fraser said, producing millions of pounds of fresh produce each year. “All we care about is getting food to hungry people,” he said. It’s essential for children to get adequate nutrition during their early years to lead healthy and happy, productive lives.
