Tag: food-bank

You Can’t Build Food Justice Through Efficiency

I recently had a conversation with a volunteer at a food pantry who voiced frustration that the organization didn’t seem to be thinking about the client experience. They observed that volunteers were being discouraged from restocking empty shelves even when there was ample food, and that clients were told they should “come earlier” to get high-demand items rather than asking volunteers to help meet their needs.

Due to a shortage of help, leadership was seeking to increase efficiency and reduce the demands on volunteers. As a result, clients were exasperated and volunteers fearful that the shopping experience was increasingly humiliating and disrespectful.

I understand these decisions and why they happen. Managing a pantry’s food supply in all its complexity is exhausting and takes careful juggling, rapid assessment, and confidence in your instincts. (Overseeing food flow is one of my favorite parts of pantry operations- it’s an art form!)

The nonprofit sector is intimately aware that volunteer rates are decreasing. While many organizations experienced a surge in volunteering during the pandemic when unemployment was high, most have now returned to work and cut back on their service.

As a result, food pantries are rethinking their operations to run with less help, and the primary way to do that is by increasing efficiency. While it is an essential component of any institution, this volunteer’s concerns demonstrate how it can also subtract focus from the true mission of fighting hunger.

Why not efficiency?

Efficiency is all about achieving a goal with as little energy, waste, or effort as possible. In many businesses, this is important and logical. But when it comes to anti-hunger efforts, it’s vital to remember what your organization is really hoping to achieve. If our mission is to end hunger, then efficiency may not be the best path forward.

There is an intensely emotional component of using food assistance. It can feel incredibly vulnerable to ask for help.

I’ve heard hundreds of stories from people who had a negative experience at a food pantry and chose to go without food rather than risk such treatment again.  Even worse, individuals may internalize the idea that they must undergo disrespect to deserve this help (“I need to be grateful for whatever I can get”).

Both experiences are unacceptable.

How can food pantries ensure that they are not sacrificing the client experience in favor of efficiency?

The most important component is to develop an organizational culture that prioritizes dignity and intentionality. Food pantries with cultures that concentrate on the client experience empower their volunteers to go the extra mile for individuals walking through their doors.

Whatever your goal is, here’s how to examine the balance of efficiency and dignity within your organization:

Unlike a for-profit business, the end goal does not justify the means. We’re not building food justice if clients leave feeling disrespected, neglected, or without the food their family needs to feel nourished and safe. We’re failing in our services if the volunteer experience sacrifices that of individuals seeking food assistance.

Negative volunteering experiences reduce the number of volunteers, which further pushes organizations to lean on efficiency over dignity. Without intervention, this produces an endless cycle that leaves neither clients nor volunteers feeling fulfilled or satisfied.

While we should always be brainstorming ways to improve food assistance, it’s important that we do so in ways that lift up food justice first, even at the expense of efficiency.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!

You Can’t Solve Hunger with an “Us” vs. “Them” Attitude

At one of my previous food pantries, we had a volunteer who was perpetually cheerful, eternally welcoming to clients, and one of the most compassionate individuals I could have chosen for our team. This individual was also a client who regularly used our services.

They always made a special effort to greet the clients waiting in line two full hours before we opened. When I expressed my appreciation, this volunteer explained that as a shopper they loved our team’s welcoming habit of checking on those waiting in line.  They wanted all our visitors to feel the same way: like an equal, appreciated, and respected.  This client-volunteer’s efforts transformed our shoppers’ food pantry visits from a degrading and shameful experience into a moment of feeling dignified and respected.

Unfortunately, even in 2024, judgement, bias and “otherization” still permeate the policies and practices of many anti-hunger and community support organizations in the United States. 


 As an example, some anti-hunger leaders and organizations still discourage volunteering by their own clients.  Allowing clients to be insiders, they argue, increases the risk of conflict of interest, abuse of power, and manipulation of the food supply. 

In my years managing food pantries, I’ve seen all these unfortunate behaviors.  However, I’ve never once witnessed this type of behavior from client volunteers. I have regularly witnessed it from advantaged and entitled volunteers or non-profit supporters with no lived experience.  And too often, I’ve been instructed by leadership to ignore these negative behaviors, especially if confronting them risked alienating donors or friends of the “inner circle,” while also being responsible for ensuring my clients don’t violate the same rules. Despite all evidence to the contrary, these policies reinforce the attitude that people facing food insecurity can’t be trusted, and should depend on the wisdom and leadership of others.

This baseless concern about client volunteers is just one way that we project our biases and assumptions about hunger onto clients without any real basis in reality.  We are long overdue to abandon these assumptions about food insecurity.

As Americans, we’ve been conditioned to assume that people who use welfare or need food assistance are untrustworthy, unreliable, and make poor choices.

As a result, most elements of food pantry and emergency food assistance policy are based on this assumption- that we must protect these programs from abuse and corruption, instead of ensuring families have the food they need to thrive.  Turning away volunteers with lived experience deprives organizations of essential insights and perpetuates the stigma and discrimination that accompany hunger.


Having clients serve as volunteers can be uncomfortable because their presence and input requires us to check our biases and pay closer attention to the experience of being a food pantry client. Clients serving as volunteers gives food pantries an opportunity to learn their weaknesses and strive to do better, if we can foster the humility for this lesson.

But it’s also essential to make sure that we are not using these clients as our primary sounding board for educating on dignity. In the same misguided way that too many people called on their friends of color to educate them in racial justice issues in 2020, it’s important we do the work to research and learn the reality of hunger without exploiting our community.

As someone without lived experience of hunger, I try to provide services that I have never myself depended on.

As a result, it’s easy for me and my colleagues to fall victim to the assumptions and biases that abound surrounding food insecurity and food assistance.

This is why building spaces for those with lived experience to safely speak up is essential, and why it’s important to evaluate whether your organization is a safe space for that vulnerability.

If we can transform our anti-hunger institutions into centers of humility and compassion for continual growth, we can amplify our impact by moving beyond assumption to ensure we’re addressing the problems our neighbors face, and not the ones we think they do.

Major appreciation to Kern Herron for his input on the writing of this post.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!

Can You Find Fun in the Kitchen When You’re Food Insecure?

One of my regular food pantry clients once came up to me the moment she walked in the door and shouted, “I LOVE BRUSSELS SPROUTS!”

She told me that she had never had them before but we had an abundance the last time she came to the pantry, so she decided to give them a try. It turned out she was a big fan; she had just never had the opportunity to taste them. Every time since, she would load up on these oft-maligned veggies.  

Our society is eager to condemn people experiencing hunger for eating unhealthy foods. With the prevalent assumption that people experience hunger because of poor judgement, it’s easy to assume that this applies to their food choices as well. This motivates many anti-hunger programs to focus on making decisions for people experiencing food insecurity, like what foods they should and shouldn’t have access to.

We see this attitude perpetuated in regular proposals to increase restrictions on foods purchased with SNAP dollars, in a misguided attempt to force people to eat healthier. SNAP is already inadequate, so this restriction reduces available options without addressing any of the limitations that already exist, like high costs of healthy foods.

The reality is, the only way we can empower people to eat better quality food and to try new things is to give them the capacity to experiment and take risks. (On another day we will also examine the need for time to cook, which means not having to work three jobs; and having a functional kitchen, which means safe and affordable housing.)

We can fight hunger by giving everyone room in their food budget for failure.

Even the most accomplished cooks occasionally make meals that aren’t winners, and every parent knows that their kids will sometimes refuse even the most perfectly prepared meal.

There is security in buying the foods that you know your family enjoys. With a too-tight food budget, it is an unnecessary risk to buy something that your family might not eat. When money is short, it can’t be wasted.

The client who loved Brussels sprouts had four hungry teenagers at home, so she had to maximize her food budget to ensure everyone had enough to eat. Why would she risk spending money on Brussels sprouts that those kids might refuse, or that she might not like, when she already was struggling to keep everyone fed?

But offering Brussels sprouts at the food pantry gave her room to take risks. There were no trade-offs if her family didn’t want to eat them- only a lesson learned.

If we really want to empower people experiencing food insecurity to eat healthier and try new foods, then we need to facilitate the conditions that allow risk-taking.

Children, and people of all ages, often need several exposures to a new food before they start to like it. That requires the capacity to serve it, and have it rejected multiple times before it is accepted. For someone who struggles to afford every bite, this is a nearly impossible risk.

Although food pantries are an inadequate response to hunger, this is one area where they offer opportunity. When clients are empowered to shop for themselves with as few restrictions as possible, there’s room to try something new. There’s no risk if their child refuses to eat the new vegetable, or it turns out the whole family hates that flavor of sauce. They can experiment with tofu just to say they tried it and see for themselves whether Brussels sprouts really deserve their reputation.

While health should absolutely be a priority in anti-hunger work, it’s important that we not lose sight of all the nuances that go into creating an environment where people can eat what’s right for their bodies, and not just what fits within their budget.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!

Are You Gatekeeping While You Fight for Food Justice?

As a resident of Portland, Oregon, my city is famously mocked for once buying up all the kale in the face of an approaching snowstorm.

Kale is a popular superfood. It’s a power-packed leafy green that is versatile in salads, smoothies, soups, and more. I confess I’m a fan and regular consumer.

But at a food pantry just outside of Portland, we used to receive regular donations of kale while almost always struggling to give it away. Our clients just didn’t seem interested.

This week I finished reading How the Other Half Eats by Dr. Priya Fielding-Singh, who at one point examines kale’s cultural context. She observes that “…kale is generally marketed toward and endorsed by upper middle class, primarily white people. Because of that, while kale may be healthy, it is seen as a wealthy white person’s food, making its appeal culturally limited and its glorification culturally alienating” (123).

America aggressively condemns SNAP recipients for buying expensive food like organic produce. Theoretical examples of welfare fraud almost always reference lobster. Promotions for building food security depend heavily on learning to cook dry beans. It’s been made very clear that people living in poverty aren’t supposed to eat the same foods as rich people.

In a food pantry, where every food choice is often judged and scrutinized, it makes complete sense that clients shy away from a food we have all been taught to see as part of a rich person’s diet.

Because every food has a cultural context, it’s essential that we explore intangible barriers like this to see how our attitudes influence the landscape around us.

Kale Versus Collard Greens

Kale and collard greens are closely related, with almost identical nutritional profiles. Yet their place in foodie culture heavily impacts which one people eat, depending on their background.

Despite their similarities, kale is lauded as a powerhouse superfood while collard greens are judged for their place in soul food, southern-influenced cooking identified with Black America which is stereotyped as much less healthy.

The stereotypes and assumptions we carry about foods like kale and collards build barriers just as significant as any challenge of cost or access.

There is no “right” way to eat. Every culture has a culinary tradition on which people have thrived for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.

Our cultural obsession with identifying “right” and “wrong” foods fails us and the communities we come from.

Building food justice means ensuring that everyone has access to the foods that they want to eat and are not constrained by the ideas of what society has established their identity should eat.

How Do We Practice Embracing All Food Choices?

  • Find out what food pantry clients want to eat. What are the dominant cultures shopping at your pantry, and what are their essential foods? It’s also important to examine why your organization does not offer them already (if that’s the case). Were they evaluated in comparison to other foods in making this decision? While these foods may be more expensive or harder to find, their absence likely reinforces existing biases about what foods are good or appropriate for shoppers.
  • Recognize and call out bias. I often witness volunteers celebrating certain kinds of donations, like cheese or expensive options which are familiar to them, while donations of lemongrass and lamb are ignored. Evaluating foods as we see them makes it very clear which foods are valued and celebrated, and what are not. Finding ways to celebrate all foods can help stop reinforcing attitudes within the organization, and grow your teams’ understanding of food justice.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!

Are You Really Fighting Hunger if Your Staff Can’t Afford Food?

At the very first food pantry I ever worked at, our parent organization (one of the biggest nonprofits in the region) was enthusiastic and vocal about prioritizing the client experience. I was excited to partner on this mission, until I learned that this focus on client services was achieved at the expense of staff. Our leaders were adamant that the organization could only afford the most minimal wages and benefits to ensure maximum support for our clients. Because I could not afford groceries on this wage, I became a client at my own food pantry.

Although this happened over a decade ago, it is a pattern I have seen repeated at every food pantry I’ve worked with since. Full-time staff members unable to support themselves or their family on their wages become clients of their own services, which the organization provides without a second thought.

Can you really be an anti-hunger advocate if you’re not willing to make sacrifices for the mission? This attitude is pervasive, and perpetuates a culture that actively inhibits people from thriving while doing this work.

Why is food insecurity accepted within anti-hunger organizations?

American society has narrow attitudes about nonprofits. The belief persists that nonprofit employees should do the work out of the goodness of their hearts rather than for the money.

I once had a Board member brag that our organization paid staff in “heart” to make up for low wages, as if that was an achievement to be celebrated that employees would appreciate.

Paying individuals less than a living wage is a primary cause of food insecurity.

Whether or not money is a motivating factor for nonprofit professionals, it does not mean that we are somehow exempt from paying rent, buying gasoline, or the rising cost of groceries.

When organizations advocating for food justice perpetuate food insecurity, it should throw serious doubt on their commitment. Denying employees the resources to buy their own food while employed at an anti-hunger institution demonstrates a perversely performative interest in fighting hunger.

While every organization benefits from leadership who knows what it’s like to be food insecure, we should not tolerate those that force lived experience upon their employees.

Food banks and pantries who recognize hunger as a systemic problem rather than an individual responsibility are slowly beginning to demonstrate it by working towards institutionalizing living wages.

This is not a simple or easy change. Nonprofit culture uplifts and celebrates low overhead costs and strong client services, an attitude deeply internalized by funders. My previous food pantry regularly received donations specifically allocated for food to ensure that it was spent on clients rather than staff. But this is short-sighted. Who do donors anticipate will do the work if no one should be paid?

Most nonprofits already lean heavily on volunteers, and have paid staff for the jobs that require additional expertise, reliability, or confidentiality. The nonprofit field is one place where these professional individuals are regularly degraded for seeking a comfortable wage that appreciates their skills.

Developing effective solutions to social ills requires that we have the most creative, passionate, and enthusiastic people working on the problem. But the nonprofit field as it currently exists offers weak incentives for attracting or retaining these individuals.

Ending hunger is a complicated and multi-faceted challenge. Amidst the complexity, it’s easy to ignore how we treat the people doing the work. Paying anti-hunger advocates a living wage requires changing priorities, educating funders, and adjusting budgets. But the long-term implications are higher retention rates, improved productivity, stronger competition, and one less client waiting in line at the food pantry.

Next steps:

Check out some resources for starting these conversations from the Next Shift, a campaign encouraging anti-hunger organizations to examine internal processes and attitudes about social justice parallel to their external goals.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!

How We Get Started Solving Hunger

Hunger has long been a part of the human experience. Throughout history, our ancestors endured starvation enough that our physiology adapted to withstand periods of abundance and of scarcity, which is why we struggle so in our current calorie-rich environment. Despite the abundance of food in our world today, hunger remains so normalized that eliminating it tends to be added to lists of aspirational-but-unobtainable goals like world peace and time travel.

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) framework for food security identifies four essential conditions necessary for an individual, community, and nation to be food secure- access, availability, knowledge, and stability. An evaluation of these conditions can help inform us on why hunger persists, and provide a starting point for action.

Is hunger really inevitable?

To eliminate hunger completely in the US, we need to ensure that every resident has each of these conditions fulfilled:

  • Access: This is our biggest hurdle. Inflation and high costs of living severely cut into food budgets. Even living in close proximity to grocery stores, too many people cannot afford to nourish themselves. In isolated or rural regions, the higher costs associated with accessing it make food even harder to maintain food security. People experiencing discrimination have further reduced access because of lower wages, poorer housing, or a lack of physical safety in their community.

High food costs force many people to work longer hours or multiple jobs, which further cuts into time and energy available for cooking. Inadequate and unaffordable housing necessitates survival with substandard kitchen and restricted cooking capabilities, which further impacts the ability to safely store and prepare food.

  • Knowledge: People living in poverty are regularly condemned for lacking budget-friendly cooking skills, as if knowing how to cook dry beans can somehow extricate them from poverty. Knowing how to cook is a powerful way for improving quality of life and adding fun to the process of nourishment, but the idea that a lack of cooking skills is a cause of hunger comes from the assumption that hunger is personal failure rather than systemic problem. Further, programs that uphold this idea often teach cooking a precise way, or use specific ingredients, which ignores cultural traditions and identity. By dictating that there is a “right” and “wrong” way to eat, it implies that those who don’t use these specific practices perpetuate their own poverty. A lack of knowledge is not a contributor to food insecurity in the US.

Improving food access is the primary solution for solving hunger in America.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is our primary tool for addressing food insecurity (although there are many others). SNAP provides families with an allotted amount of money every month that can be spent on food at participating retailers. The amount of money received assumes that household costs for food are much lower than they actually are. As a result, even those receiving food assistance still experience food insecurity.

At the onset of the pandemic, when millions of people lost their jobs or had their hours reduced, hunger loomed. In response, the government both expanded the amount of benefits as well as the flexibility of anti-hunger programs, and it worked.

Effective policy action has shown us that hunger is not inevitable. We have the resources, the knowledge, and the policy mechanisms to end hunger. We simply lack the political will.

As the Covid-era programs implemented to fight hunger expire, we see the need once again rising. Fears of welfare fraud and belief in individual responsibility have overridden our commitment to ending hunger as supports are reduced or eliminated.

Next Steps

We must change the way we think about hunger. The cultural assumptions we carry and the policy tools we use perpetuate the attitude that hunger is a personal failure rather than a systemic problem.

 To facilitate the evolution of our policy solutions, our discussion on this issue must evolve too. By adjusting how we frame and talk about hunger, we can significantly impact the anti-hunger environment around us to transform this nebulous issue into a tangible problem with a practical solution.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

Want to learn more about food justice? Subscribe so you never miss a post!