ABOUT GLEANING Pick crops to help feed the needy POVERTY AND OBESITY HEALTH ON A BUDGET
Gleaners rake in pounds of prime produce
BY AMY FLOWERS UMBLE
Date published: 9/2/2008
By Flowers Umble
BY AMY FLOWERS UMBLE
Prolific orange orbs practically pop off the vines at Red Rake Farm in Hanover County.
For farmer Peter Perkins, the organic sweet, orange cherry tomatoes garner $5 per pint at a Northern Virginia farmers market. Well, these tomatoes won't. They're ripe, juicy and tangy. But they're not the highest quality, so the sooner they come off the vines, the sooner the green tomatoes left behind ripen into $5-per-pint delicacies.
For Carol Breitinger, communications director of a hunger-relief agency based in Western Virginia, these tomatoes could represent part of the 96 billion pounds of food that rots in fields, at warehouses and on the side of the road in America every year--fresh produce wasted before it ever makes it to market.
But Perkins' tomatoes won't be part of that 96 billion pounds of wasted food. About five years ago, he realized he needed help getting the not-quite-commercial-grade tomatoes off the vines. He got out the phone book, looked up "gleaning services" and found Breitinger's agency, The Society of St. Andrew.
The nonprofit gleaning group is based in Big Island, a town between Roanoke and Lynchburg. Its gleaning networks, covering 20 states, serve more than 500 food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens, picking leftover fruits and vegetables after the harvest.
The Richmond-area gleaning network, which plucks cherry tomatoes from Perkins' farm, collected more than 10,000 pounds of fresh produce this summer, said gleaning coordinator Jennifer Murrow.
Volunteers donated the blueberries, corn, tomatoes and more to the Richmond food bank, the Fredericksburg Area Food Bank, several church food pantries in Caroline County and soup kitchens in Richmond.
NUTRITIOUS DONATIONS
The fresh produce helps keep low-income people healthy, said Oya Oliver, director of the Fredericksburg Area Food Bank.
Fresh food costs more--apples, pears, tomatoes and green beans sell for about $1.50 per pound at the grocery store. Canned ravioli costs 79 cents per pound and a box of macaroni and cheese, 75 cents. The average food-stamp allotment in Virginia is $220 per month, and the cheaper foods last longer on that budget. With rising fuel costs, many who don't qualify for food stamps still struggle to buy groceries, Oliver said.
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The Virginia Cooperative Extension offers a Family Nutrition Program, funded through the Department of Social Services. It helps people who could be eligible for food stamps. Mary Belman, program assistant, teaches people how to eat healthy on a budget. Here are some of her tips:
Make a menu: Survey your fridge and pantry, look through sale fliers, then plan a menu for the week.
Make a list: Base your grocery list on that menu. And stick to the list when you go to the store.
Shop once a week: Any more or less and you'll spend more money.
Don't shop hungry: This tempts you to buy expensive snacks and ready-to-eat foods.
Go generic: Store brands often offer a better buy with good quality.
Read the labels: The first ingredient is the one with the largest quantity. Don't waste money on foods that provide mainly fat, sugar and empty calories.
Go skim: Low-fat milk often costs a little less and offers the same nutritional value as whole milk, without all the fat.
Stay in season: Fruits and vegetables cost less in season.
Be fresh: Buy only vegetables and fruits free from wilting, bruises and decay.
Chill out: Sometimes frozen or canned fruits and vegetables offer the same nutrition for less money.
Make your own: Homemade baked goods can have more iron and complex vitamins than the ready-to-eat varieties. And they usually cost less.
Go for the grain: Whole-grain cereals provide more nutrition and tend to cost less than the sugary, fancy-flavored cereals.
Jill La Brasseur, communications specialist for the national initiative Fruits & Veggies--More Matters, offers more tips for boosting nutrition on a budget:
Cut back on meat: Most Americans eat more than they should. "Open up a can of peas and carrots, and serve everyone a smaller pork chop," La Brasseur said.
Toss in a handful: Casseroles and Hamburger Helper meals can be cheap and easy. Make them go farther--and bump up the nutrition factor--by adding frozen vegetables.
Surf the Web: The Fruits & Veggies--More Matters Web site offers hundreds of fruit and vegetable recipes, along with a meal-planning guide. Other sites offer similar helps.
Stock up on sales: Frozen and canned fruits and vegetables and 100 percent juice sometimes go on sale. Stock up at these times. The frozen, canned and juiced options offer almost as much nutrition as fresh produce, La Brasseur said.
Consider nutrition: That bag of potato chips might cost less per volume than the bag of baby carrots. But you get more nutrition per dollar with the carrots.
fruitsandveggiesmorematters.org
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The practice of picking leftover crops dates at least back to biblical times, when farmers were told to leave food growing in the fields for the widowed and poor.
More and more hunger relief groups have turned to the practice in the past year, as rising food and fuel costs have made it difficult to keep the cupboards packed.
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The lack of fresh fruits and vegetables could be one reason why poverty has been linked to obesity. A recent study found that seven of the most obese states are also among the top 10 poorest states.
A study on American fruit and vegetable consumption found that poor people were less likely to eat enough produce. The survey said some reasons for this included: the low cost and convenience of snack foods; widespread advertising for "nutritionally poor foods"; and government subsidies. The U.S. government subsidizes corn and cotton crops but not more nutritional fruit and vegetable crops.
--Amy Flowers Umble
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Date published: 9/2/2008
Most recent reader comments:
Great work
(posted by
Fredtastic
, Sep. 2, 2008 1:20 pm)
I worked with the Society of St. Andrew back in high school and college in the mid-90s and they are a great organization. It is a great way to help the needy and act on your faith. Kudos to the farmer who took the initiative to make the phone call as well. Without landowners like them, this wouldn't work. Well done!
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