Federal Cuts Gut Food Banks as They Face Record Demand
“Food bank shortages caused by high demand and cuts to federal aid programs have some residents of a small community that straddles Idaho and Nevada growing their own food to get by.
For those living in Duck Valley, a reservation of about 1,000 people that is home to the Shoshone-Paiute Tribes, there’s just one grocery store where prices are too high for many to afford, said Brandy Bull Chief, local director of a federal food distribution program for tribes. The next-closest grocery stores are more than 100 miles away in Mountain Home, Idaho, and Elko, Nevada. And the local food bank’s troubles are mirrored by many nationwide, squeezed between growing need and shrinking aid.
Reggie Premo, a community outreach specialist at the University of Nevada-Reno Extension, grew up cattle ranching and farming alfalfa in Duck Valley. He runs workshops to teach residents to grow produce. Premo said he has seen increased interest from tribal leaders in the state worried about high costs while living in food deserts.
“We’re just trying to bring back how it used to be in the old days,” Premo said, “when families used to grow gardens.”
Food bank managers across the country say their supplies have been strained by rising demand since the covid pandemic-era emergency Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits ended two years ago and steepening food prices. Now, they say, demand is compounded by recent cuts in federal funding to food distribution programs that supply staple food items to pantries nationwide.
In March, the U.S. Department of Agriculture cut $500 million from the Emergency Food Assistance Program, which buys food from domestic producers and sends it to pantries nationwide. The program has supplied more than 20% of the distributions by Feeding America, a nonprofit that serves a network of over 200 food banks and 60,000 meal programs.
The collision between rising demand and falling support is especially problematic for rural communities, where the federal program might cover 50% or more of food supplied to those in need, said Vince Hall, chief government relations officer of Feeding America. Deepening the challenge for local food aid organizations is an additional $500 million the Trump administration slashed from the USDA Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which helped state, tribal, and territorial governments buy fresh food from nearby producers.
“The urgency of this crisis cannot be overstated,” Hall said, adding that the Emergency Food Assistance Program is “rural America’s hunger lifeline.”
Read more at Kaiser Health News.