Soaring Food and Fuel Prices Create Urgent Need for a Farm Bill
Low-income Americans and food banks struggling nationwide
CHICAGO --- April 4, 2008 --- As the cost of food and fuel skyrockets, and the April 18 deadline for the current Farm Bill extension nears, millions of hungry Americans are turning to the nation’s food banks, soup kitchens and food pantries for help and finding shockingly low levels of inventory. The Farm Bill, stuck in Congressional debate for several months, would bring much needed relief to food banks and low-income Americans through increased funding and improvements in federal nutrition programs, including the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and the Food Stamp Program.
“Hungry Americans can not wait any longer,” said Vicki Escarra, president and chief executive officer of America’s Second Harvest. “We are seeing absolutely tragic increases nationwide in the number of men, women and children in need of emergency food assistance, many for the first time ever. Meanwhile, more than 1.3 million more people are enrolled in food stamps compared to a year prior. Hungry Americans need a Farm Bill enacted now.”
Food banks around the country report an estimated 20 percent more people are visiting soup kitchens and food pantries for help this year compared to last year.
There are several factors contributing to this dire situation and making it difficult for food banks to feed more hungry people. Federal commodity support for emergency feeding organizations has dropped nearly $200 million per year since the enactment of 2002 Farm Bill because of a decline in need for the federal government to buy surplus food to support farmers. Additionally, food price inflation has caused rapid erosion in the purchasing power of food stamp benefits. While benefits are adjusted for inflation annually, food prices have risen 5.5 percent since the last adjustment just six months ago.
“These combined factors have created a perfect storm of hardship,” said Escarra.
America’s Second Harvest is calling upon Congress complete the Farm Bill and to increase the level of mandatory funding for TEFAP to $250 million a year with the amount indexed for inflation in order to provide a steady and stable source of food for food banks over the next five years. It also supports significant improvements in the Food Stamp Program to increase benefit levels, eligibility and participation, and help households accumulate greater resources to attain self sufficiency.
“Food stamp enrollment is projected to reach record high levels, during the coming year. This rapid rise in food stamp participation is being fueled by the worsening economic downturn,” said Escarra. “Low-income families are desperately in need of a new Farm Bill to make improvements in the programs that help ensure that they can put food on their tables and lead productive, healthy lives in this nation so richly blessed with food resources.”
Private food donations to food banks also have declined by approximately 9 percent. Many food banks have been forced to resort using their scarce resources to purchase food to meet the needs of hungry people in their community.
America's Second Harvest — The Nation's Food Bank Network is the largest charitable domestic hunger-relief organization in the United States. Through its network of more than 200 member food banks, America's Second Harvest annually provides assistance to more than 25 million people in need, including more than 9 million children and nearly 3 million seniors in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Each year, America's Second Harvest secures and distributes more than 2 billion pounds of food and grocery products to support feeding programs at approximately 50,000 local charitable agencies, including food pantries, soup kitchens, emergency shelters, after-school programs, and Kids Cafes. To learn more, please visit www.secondharvest.org.
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Contact:
Maura Daly
Office: 312.641.6421
Cell: 301.943.3733
Ross Fraser
Office: 312.641.6422
Cell: 312.307.8470
