The Food Bank of Delaware continues to hold mobile food pantries this month. Officials say the crowds are smaller than at the start of the pandemic, but the need remains.
The Food Bank of Delaware has distributed more than 9.8 million pounds of food since Mid-March —about twice as much as during the same period last year. And the organization estimates about 50,000 more Delawareans have become food insecure since the start of the pandemic.
But Food Bank Communications Director Kim Turner says the crowds at mobile food pantries have leveled off in recent months.
“Our largest numbers were in the beginning of the pandemic when things started to shut down,” said Turner. “In June our numbers did go down a bit, and then they did start to tick back up in August and September, but we’re not seeing nearly the demand that we were seeing in March, April and May.”
The Food Bank is organizing three mobile pantries—one in each county—starting next week. Each event is prepared to handle up 1,000 households.
The Food Bank has held 18 food distribution events during the pandemic. Those events have distributed just over 2 million pounds of food.
Turner says it has helped to have access to extra food from the USDA - since the federal agency began purchasing billions of dollars of food from U.S. farmers to mitigate the loss of overseas markets during the tariff war with China.
“Prior to COVID we were seeing increases of food deliveries from USDA. So, thankfully, when the pandemic started we were in a good spot in terms of the amount of USDA food we were receiving,” she said.
The upcoming events are Scheduled for Monday, October 19 at Crossroad Community Church in Georgetown, Wednesday, October 20 at the Dover International Speedway and Thursday October 22 at Glasgow High School in Newark.
