Over the last few years, MANNA staff, volunteers, and partners have watched as the number of WNC residents seeking emergency food support grows. In 2016, MANNA distributed over 13.6 million meals across WNC. MANNA continues to distribute record amounts of food every year, and with that increase in the need for food comes an increase in the need for resources and funding to provide that food. That is where our supporters step in, and help ensure that we have the resources we need to respond quickly to our community’s needs. Thanks to these supporters, MANNA is providing not only full plates of food, but full plates of healthy, balanced nutrition.
This year, Darden Foundation provided support to our food distribution program which helps low-income WNC residents access the food they need to feed themselves and their families. Darden Foundation’s support enables MANNA to provide the food for 10,500 meals to residents across the 16 counties of MANNA’s service area.
Also stepping up to help us meet the community’s food needs is MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger. Thanks to their grant to support our general operations, we can provide the food for 35,000 meals – enough to cover almost a day’s worth of MANNA food distribution activities! Thanks to MAZON for this tangible investment in WNC, we are moving more food across the mountains.
A very generous grant received in February from the Sisters of Mercy of North Carolina Foundation has enabled MANNA to provide 122,500 meals to seniors, children, and individuals facing an empty plate. This support is an investment in the health and well being of the one in six people, and one in four children experiencing hunger in WNC.
Vital support this year has also come from the Beattie Foundation, who took action against hunger by providing the resources to help MANNA distribute enough food for 17,500 meals. The Beattie Foundation’s gift is helping to stabilize families that are facing a unique socio-economic storm of challenges in WNC, allowing MANNA to fill plates in the 16 western-most counties of North Carolina. This support enables MANNA to help stabilize families that are on the brink of crisis by providing the food they need to live.
Our sincere and heartfelt thanks to each of these supporters, and to the many supporters that help us piece together what it takes to move over 13.6 million meals in one year.