How do you feel about donating food to a food bank knowing it is contributing to the obesity problem among the impoverished?

Hi honey,

I don't think it's as simple as that as I volunteer time to work with homeless and hungry people and believe it or not, many of these people who are starving are overweight because they don't eat right (just like I wasn't eating right).

So if a person is hungry and poor, I have no problem donating food to them to help them out, I do it all the time. According to everyone's state, each food bank has different rules. Usually they accept food:

1. In their original, unopened packages
2. Within the expiration date on the package
3. In plastic jars or containers, not glass

Toby

The sad thing is, the kinds of foods that lend themselves to donation and storage are highly processed, inexpensive, sugary and starchy "staples" full of preservatives and chemicals.

You can't go and donate a 5 lb beef roast, or a fresh whole chicken, or fresh vegetables, or anything that's good for anyone.

Faced with a choice like that -- I always go lesser of two evils. My conscience informs me that it is more just to feed the people something than to abstain from donating food that I know is not good for them. but that's just me.

Tough question!

I've thought about this same thing. I have cleaned out my cupboard; cereals, oatmeal, crackers, etc...and I bring them into work and feed the birds in the parking lot. Working in a big city, I'm sure there are seeds, etc around for the birds, but they flock to me (sometimes) and I toss them some broken up bread, crackers and cereal and they eat everything.
I've donated canned fruits, canned corn, pasta and such to the food pantry. I feel it's better than nothing. People are hungry and need any little bit of help they can get. Just how I feel.

I donate money to food pantries rather than packaged goods because I figure they have a better idea what they need than I do.

I do look forward to someday having a big enough garden in my backyard (within a couple of summers anyhow, we just moved here and need to put some raised beds in...work in progress..) that I can donate fresh produce from my garden.

Are you only talking about donating the stuff that we've purged from our home because we're on a low-carb WOE.


When we moved to our new apartment in October, we did purge our cabinets of all the stuff we wouldn't be eating (hubby's on a higher carb plan than I have, so we hadn't cleared it from the cupboards earlier). We found out that our local food banks didn't want most of what we had, so we did throw it out.

I discovered that they are facing the same dilemma as food banks all over the country. They're so overloaded with fatty, starchy, and sugary foods that they're reluctant to accept them (because they don't have room then for healthier stuff, and then it looks like their shelves are filled and it looks like they don't need any more when they're very, very short on proteins and vegetables), but they usually do except them because if they turn down any food, people assume they don't need any or worse become offended that their gift wasn't appreciated (either way risking drops in donations).

The best they can do is throw away some of the crap to make room when "good food" comes in. So, if the food banks are even throwing the stuff out, I guess I feel I probably should too.

The best thing I think to do is call and ask your local food banks what they need. During some times of the year, and in some locations, anything is appreciated (if we're talking about a location that has experienced a natural disaster or which has chronic food shortages).




Now, if you're generically talking about food that you shop for with donation in mind, canned and shelf-stable foods do not have to mean unhealthy foods.

First, you can call and find out if any of your local shelters have refrigerator and freezer space and whether they accept produce (some do - for example our local foodbank does accept some produce, they just can accept onlyu limited donations of it).

Canned or pouches of meats (tuna, chicken, etc), nuts, nut butters, canned vegetables, fruit canned in water or juice).

Not everyone needs to eat very low-carb, so whole grains such as brown rice and beans are good also.

That's really nice HealthierLori. I miss having a garden. Growing up, in the country, we had a huge garden, my great Aunt and Uncle had chickens and cows, we always had fresh eggs, fresh, raw milk, beef, chicken. Pear trees, apple trees, strawberry plants, so much that now I wish I would have appreciated it more back then.
I think my system would go into shock if I were to eat that way again, so fresh and "stress free" is what my father used to say. Plus, he hunted and we ended up preferring venison to beef. Not anymore, although it has been years since I've had venison.
Oh...the good old days. We weren't over weight, but my mom would always make the three of us kids go outside and play. We had horses, snow mobiles, 63 acres and cousins all around us. Plus, we had to get up and change the channel on the tv. LOL

I really just wanted to see where people stood on this issue. As in if we think the food isn't good for us, its probably not good for our community either. A lot of people are well fed as far as food volume intake goes but are still starving due to lack of nutrients. So are we helping any when we donate less nutritious items? We are feeding their bellies but not their bodies.

In a situation comparing NO food to LESS NUTRITIOUS food, I'd say that bellies are better than nothing. As Kaplods said, though, most food banks have an oversupply of unhealthy junk and an undersupply of meats and veggies. Still, if I was genuinely hungry, and my choices were to not eat or to eat a sugar cereal from a food bank, I'd find it awfully presumptuous of someone to say "well, that's not so good for you, so you'd be better off going hungry, since this will contribute to you being obese".

I've never understood in general the "charity" of taking food YOU won't eat and expecting someone to be happy when you donate it. I remember in grade school the canned food drives, and you'd end up with piles of stuff that had clearly been sitting in the back of someone's pantry for 10 years that was hardly any good to anyone. That's not charity - it's a guilt-free way to get around your own food waste and get free disposal of your pantry-garbage. I used to spend my allowance to buy actual usable things like canned beans, veggies, and meats.

This is really the issue I was trying to get at. The answer is NO, we are not helping them very much if we're not donating nutritious food - so the answer is not "don't donate," it's "donate nutritious food."

And there is nutrititious shelf-stable food, but sadly it isn't what's being donated. From what I've read and heard the majority of donations seem to fall into two categories

1. Pantry purges. People donating food that they aren't willing to eat - either because of diet changes or because the food is outdated or past it's sell by date. Many foods, such as canned foods are often still good long after their sell by date, and many food pantries are able to accept these donations, but in some areas it's not legal to do so. The ethics of donating food that you consider unfit for consumption should be an issue.


2. Donating "treats." People often donate foods they perceive as treats out of the mistaken idea that such food are rare. They donate candy, cake, sweet cereals, and chips believing that healthy staples are abundant and that treat foods are less available, so would be appreciated more (when the reverse is true). As a result, people are thinking they're doing something nice in giving treats, not realizing that people are going without protein, because only donuts and doritos are available.


My best advice for anyone wanting to donate to a food pantry - give money or call and ask the food pantry what they need most.

If it's a choice between the trash can & someone needy, I pick someone needy.

If it's about public policy of dietary advice for everyone then yeah, I think there are too many carbs involved.

But most people choose the carbs no matter what their income and environment, so it seems unfair to make the choice for other people in hard circumstances.

I too think money or time are the best investments into these kinds of charities .... and I do wish our national nutritional guidelines did something beyond vilify fat and praise carbs.