A group of Oxford Jr/Sr High School students in Kansas are providing fresh vegetables to their school backpack program. Students in Lebanon, Connecticut, are raising broilers, laying hens and hogs to provide fresh protein sources to the local food pantry. The students – and thousands like them throughout the U.S. – are all FFA members utilizing grant monies to implement long-term, real-world solutions to ease hunger in their communities.
The National FFA Organization has awarded nearly $330,000 in grants to start new service-learning projects or sustain existing programs they have created to fight hunger locally. This year, a total of 138 FFA chapters have received up to $2,500 FFA: Food for All grants to develop and implement hunger solutions in their schools or communities. The grants are made possible by support from CF Industries, Elanco, Mainsource, Tractor Supply Company and Tyson as a special project of the National FFA Foundation.
All initiatives rely on FFA members and their chapters as a whole for implementation. In addition to providing food solutions, students also volunteer to help teach fellow students, grade-school students, residents and community groups how to care for, grow, prepare and preserve food.
Last year, 8,978 FFA members partnered with 7,010 non-FFA youth to volunteer a combined 129,961 hours in their communities to fight hunger. More than 185,000 pounds of fresh produce, meat and eggs were donated by 2014 Food for All grant recipients.
To learn more about what FFA chapters are doing with their grants to fight hunger in their communities, visit FFA.org/FoodForAll.
The National FFA Organization provides leadership, personal growth and career success training through agricultural education to 610,240 student members who belong to one of 7,665 local FFA chapters throughout the U.S., Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.