Christmas Idea # 3 Feeding the Hungry

For that hard to buy Chef in your life,  for the person who loves to cook or host gatherings and celebrations that could feed an army and for that teenage boy who never seems to be full and knows what its like to feel hunger, for the farmer who has made it his lifes vocation to feed the hungry.  Why not donate to the Feeding program.

The Feeding programs

FEEDING PROGRAM AT THE SCHOOLS
Each of the eight primary schools supported by the Comite Bienfaisance/Promise for Haiti provide a meal three times a week for students.  The meal, consisting of rice and beans or pasta, may be the only meal the students have that day!  Our goal is to feed the students and teachers every day and we are working with Meals from the Heartland to provide the additional meals 2 times per week.   You can help us meet that goal with your generous support! When students have proper nourishment and full tummies, their concentration improves, retention of information increases and they tend to be in school more consistently. The cost to feed an entire school 3 times a week (250-300 students) for the year is only $5,000! (that's around 25 cents a meal!)  Your contribution big or small can help us reach our goal.

HOSPITAL FEEDING PROGRAM
All patients in the hospital are now provided a meal. It has not always been so. Before the feeding program became involved patient's family provided meals for patients.   Cooks hired by the hospital now prepare a nutritious meal of rice, beans, a high protein source like meat, and occassionally, some fruit or pasta.

Workers collect bowls that patients bring along and fill them with a nutritious hot meal and return the filled bowls to the patient's room.  The servings are generous enough that some family members can also share the meal.  When patients eat a balanced meal they  recover more quickly and and their bodies heal at a faster rate. 

Ethical Feeding

Feeding can prove to be extremely difficult, as there is always tension between short-term giving and long-term sustainability. The proverb “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime” is true. But, tell that to a woman in the hospital, who just gave birth to a child and now is responsible to gather her own food. Tell that to the child going to school on empty stomachs that are now expected to learn. In these cases, we have to address the need directly in front of us.

We feed through established organizations, such as schools, hospitals and churches. This helps to reduce the corruption involved with feedings, as it predetermines who gets fed, with structures that control crowds to avoid food riots. As well, we prefer to purchase the food locally, as it creates economic development and rewards local farmers and business people. Plus, it reduces the cost of shipping and avoids the corruption often involved with customs. We partner with Convoy of Hope and Meals from the Heartland, which provide free, prepackaged meals from the US. This helps us keep our food costs down by supplementing our established feeding programs. We have fed over 40,000 meals since the inception of these programs and anticipate managing distribution of over 350,000 in 2012