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Hunger in America
During our Spring and Summer 2009 Tours (April - July), we were proud to partner with Rock for a Remedy to collect people and pet food for American familes in need. Thanks to everyone who participated, we were able to distribute 100 tons of food to those at risk of hunger! Our food drives are over for the moment, but please visit www.rockforaremedy.org to learn about other bands and their food drives.
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FACT
36.2 million people lived in households considered to be food insecure
(to be unable to reliably put food on the table for the family). Of these,
23.8 million are adults and 12.4 million are children (USDA, 2007).
FACT
In 2008, the demand for food from food banks increased by 30% (New
York Times, 2/20/09).
FACT
In 2007, the USDA found that the ten states with the highest food
insecurity rates were Mississippi, New Mexico, Texas, Arkansas, Maine,
South Carolina, Georgia, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri.
FACT
You can do something to help relieve hunger in America: donate food
or money to a food bank or other anti-hunger organization, volunteer your
time, educate yourself and others on real solutions to hunger that address
poverty and access to and distribution of food and other resources.
GET INVOLVED
Participate in Indigo Girls’ 2009 Food Drives in partnership with Rock
for a Remedy. Come to our concert in your town and bring canned or boxed
non-perishable foods that will be donated to a food bank in your community.
Bring 4 or more food items and be entered to win an autographed copy of
Poseidon and the Bitter Bug and other memorabilia. In limited areas, we
will also be collecting pet food for families struggling to feed their
pets. Please check our website and Rock for a Remedy’s website to learn
which cities are participating in pet food drives.
Read the Rock for a Remedy Press release.
For tour dates and information on the local food banks we will be supporting, click here. This page will be updated frequently, so please be sure to check back.
Read a note from Emily and Amy.
Click here to find out what kinds of food items are needed most.
Volunteer
for a Rock for a Remedy
During our May, June and July tours, we will need volunteers to help collect
food donations.
Spread the word! Tell your friends and family about the food drives. Send them an email or a text message and tell them to visit www.indigogirls.com or www.rockforaremedy.org.
RESOURCES
Rock
for a Remedy
Rock for a Remedy (RFAR) is a grassroots non-profit organization bringing
together socially conscious musicians and their civic-minded fans via
food drives all across North America, with all donations given to area
food banks in local communities. Audiences have passionately responded
to the food drive revolution, allowing Food Banks to distribute nearly
95 tons of food over RFAR’s five plus year history. Each food drive directly
benefits the community in which the concert is held.
Food
Research and Action Center
The Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) is a national nonprofit organization
working to improve public policies and public-private partnerships to
eradicate hunger and undernutrition in the United States. FRAC works with
hundreds of national, state and local nonprofit organizations, public
agencies, and corporations to address hunger and its root cause, poverty.
The
Burrito Project
The mission of Burrito Project and the Myspace burrito project information
profile is to provide people with the means to become active members in
their community and bridge the gap between the fed and the hungry. The
Project provides a model to show how easy, inexpensive, and rewarding
feeding hungry people can be. The project does not propose itself as the
solution; but a step-by-step, DIY (Do It Yourself) outline for a way to
get involved. Each branch of Burrito Project in each city is independent
of each other. Their mission and hope is to inspire other burrito project
chapters to grow organically.
DC
Hunger Solutions
DC Hunger Solutions, founded in 2002 as an initiative of the Food Research
and Action Center (FRAC), works to create a hunger-free community and
thereby improve the nutrition, health, economic security, and well-being
of low-income District residents. Specifically, DCHS: (1) Seeks to improve
public policies to end hunger, reduce poverty, promote nutrition, and
curb obesity, working to increase the availability of healthy, affordable
food in low-income areas. (2) Maximizes participation in all federal nutrition
programs through a combination of vigorous outreach, removal of obstacles
to participation, and close work with social service agencies; and (3)
Educates the public and key audiences both to the stark reality of hunger’s
existence in the midst of plenty and to solutions that are already at
hand.
Food
Not Bombs
The first chapter of Food Not Bombs was formed in Cambridge, Massachusetts
in 1980 by anti-nuclear activists. Food Not Bombs is an all-volunteer
organization dedicated to nonviolent social change. Food Not Bombs has
no formal leaders and strives to include everyone in its decision making
process. Each group recovers food that would otherwise be thrown out and
makes fresh hot vegan and vegetarian meals that are served in outside
in public spaces to anyone without restriction.
Find
Your Local Food Bank
A directory of food banks and soup kitchens across America.
The
Open Door Community (Atlanta, GA)
The Open Door Community is a residential community in the Catholic Worker
tradition that seeks to dismantle racism, sexism and heterosexism, abolish
the death penalty, and create the Beloved Community on Earth through a
loving relationship with some of the most neglected and outcast of God’s
children: the homeless and our sisters and brothers who are in prison.
They serve breakfasts and soup-kitchen lunches, provide showers and changes
of clothes, staff a free medical clinic, conduct worship services and
meetings for the clarification of thought, and provide a prison ministry,
including monthly trips for families to visit loved ones at the Hardwick
Prisons in central Georgia. They also advocate on behalf of the oppressed,
homeless and prisoners through nonviolent protests, grassroots organization
and the publication of our monthly newspaper, Hospitality.
North
American Street Newspaper Association
The North American Street Newspaper Association (NASNA) exists to support
and build effective, self-sustaining street newspapers that promote opportunities
for people living in poverty and public awareness of issues of concern
to the poor, homeless, socially excluded communities.
© 2009 Indigo Girls. All rights reserved.