BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) – The Greater Baton Rouge Food Bank serves 11 parishes and since Hurricane Ida, the demand for food in the high impact communities have kept staff busy.
“We usually give two and a half to three million pounds of food a month on a regular month, but we ramped up,” says CEO/President Mike Manning.
The non-profit has given out around that same number of food in less than a month just for Ida relief alone. The biggest goal right now is to help those who are in food deserts.
“Our team is really passionate about making the most of the time we have here to get as much food into people’s hands as possible.”
Donations can be made by simply dropping food off at the main location on South Choctaw or leaving it in a barrel or box around town.
“We’ve changed our focus. We used to take whatever we can get and distribute it. Now we’re trying to encourage more nutritious selections.”
Canned food, pasta, rice and dried beans are some of the foods that anyone can give. Right now officials don’t have a clear idea of how things are holding up due to COVID-19 and the storm.
“We used to get consistent donations from schools, then they went remote. We don’t have a good fuel for that right now until things calm down from the storm.”
As the food bank continues to fight hunger through many obstacles, one way that’ll help is the community giving back.
“We can’t do what we do without your help. We need your continued support like you’ve always done so that we continue making a difference in other people’s lives.”
If you’d like to learn more on how you can donate food, visit the Greater Baton Rouge Food Bank website.