Too Much Waste, Too Little Care Feed the Hunger in Our Midst

Hungry people were already waiting near a liquor store in Seat Pleasant when the food van arrived the other day. Volunteers from First Baptist Church of Glenarden formed a prayer circle with them and began handing out lunch bags.

"It's a relief because I don't have to worry about hunger pains for a while," Kenneth McCarthy, 51, unemployed and homeless, told me while eating the meal.

Each lunch bag contained a bologna sandwich, a cookie and a carton of juice. That was enough to lift McCarthy's spirits. "Now I can concentrate on getting to a shelter for the night," he said.

So why, if it takes so little to satiate hunger, are area food banks and pantries unable to satisfy the demand for food? Some blame sharp drops in food donations on sharp increases in food costs, along with the unstable economy. But that sounds like bologna to me.

Check out any restaurant dumpster in downtown Washington or the trash cans along any street on garbage collection day, and you're likely to find enough wasted food to fill those pantries to overflowing. Some studies have estimated that Americans throw away at least 10 percent of the food they buy -- about 470 pounds per household a year, according to University of Arizona researchers.

"The crowds we serve are getting larger and larger, and some of the people are extremely hungry," Geraldine Stewart, a member of the Glenarden church's Feed the Hungry ministry, told me. "They stand there and eat and ask for prayers. They say, 'I have AIDS; pray for me.' 'My children are sick and hungry; pray for me.' Your heart really goes out to them."

Our food should, too.

Calls to the Capital Area Food Bank's Hunger Lifeline, an emergency referral service, have more than tripled in the past six months, compared with the same period last year. The food bank supplies about 700 soup kitchens and other programs in the Washington area. The Southern Maryland Food Bank, which helps stock pantries in a three-county area, is trying to cope with a 60 percent increase in requests for food. Manna Food Center in Montgomery County served more than 3,100 families in October, a 48 percent increase from the same month last year.

Of course, there are many generous individuals and corporations among us. Giant Food, for instance, donates tens of thousands of pounds of food each year. Even more impressive are the hundreds of unsung volunteers and good Samaritans who not only donate to the poor but also help to serve them.

McCarthy probably would be in much worse shape without their help. He said he used to work as a day laborer on construction sites but injured himself 10 years ago. He's been homeless and dependent on the kindness of strangers pretty much ever since.

"Whenever I miss the food wagon, I can knock on the windows at a few houses around here, and somebody will say, 'You want something to eat?' or, 'You need a couple of dollars?' " McCarthy said.

The Glenarden church food ministry is just one example of the kind of volunteer effort without which hunger in our area would be even more of a disgrace than it is. Every Saturday, a dozen or so members show up at the church kitchen to prepare the lunch bags for delivery.