Allen Dunlap, an avid hunter from the Toledo area, has recently taken over the local chapter of Farmers and Hunters Feeding the Hungry (FHFH). Begun in 1997 FHFH, which encourages hunters to donate venison to food banks and soup kitchens, now has over 100 chapters in 30 states. Since the organization was founded, 13 million servings have been donated to emergency food organizations.

Dunlap believes that hunters can significantly increase the resources available to food banks. He points out that nearly 209,000 deer were harvested in Ohio during last year’s hunting season. The Toledo Northwestern Ohio Food Bank will be the recipient of meat from Dunlap’s chapter of FHFH. James Caldwell, president and CEO of the Toledo Northwestern Ohio Food Bank, says that his organization welcomes the help from hunters and that donations of venison are especially useful during the holiday season.

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The USDA recently released its annual report, entitled “Household Food Security,” that details access to food in the United States. The report has traditionally used “hungry” to describe those with the most limited access to food. This year the report instead uses “very low food security” to describe such populations. Mark Nord, the main author of the report, says that “hungry” is “not a scientifically accurate term for the specific phenomenon being measured in the food security survey.”

Nord further explains that to determine hunger people would have to be asked whether a lack of food leads to more severe conditions such as illness, weakness or pain. The USDA researchers are not measuring individual hunger but rather ask questions about the amount of food that can be provided to a household.

The report details the number of people who are experiencing the various levels of food insecurity. View the full report.

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The recently released USDA “Household Food Security” report shows an increase of food insecurity in Ohio. The report found that an estimated 12.6% of Ohio households had low or very low food security in 2003-2005. That figure is up from 11.4% during 2002-2004. There are only 12 states ranked worse than Ohio, and only Maine and South Carolina have showed faster increases in the number of food insecure households.

Food banks in Ohio, such as Faith Mission in Columbus, are directly impacted by such increases. Faith Mission, which serves three meals every day of the week, saw its monthly total increase to 24,000 in October 2006. Kathy Adamson, food service manager at Faith Mission, says that the largest increases have been among men but the numbers for women and children have also increased.

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Students at Brooks Quinn-Jones Elementary in Nacogdoches, Texas are piloting a universal free breakfast program. According to the district’s nutritionist the switch to a breakfast program was made because school nutrition programs have proven to positively influence students’ habits. The program is part of a larger plan to encourage healthy eating and physical activity in the school district.

The universal free breakfast program began in the end of October and has proven successful in the first few weeks. Part of its success is due to the fact that the program is flexible and allows teachers to make decisions about when and where the students can eat breakfast. Some breakfasts are delivered to class, while others are picked up in the cafeteria or retrieved as a “grab-and-go” meal on the way from one class to another. The teachers have noted that with the new program students are more prepared to start the day, more attentive during class and have better attendance.

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The New York Council Speaker, Christine Quinn, spoke at a Manhattan elementary school about the use of the Food Stamp Program. She spoke as part of a month-long initiative to clarify qualifications for the food stamp program and urged those in need to make use of food stamps.

Her remarks, which were translated into Spanish, were also geared toward immigrants to the United States. She clarified how immigrants and their children could qualify for food stamps. Councilwoman Quinn also noted that as many as 500,000 New Yorkers who are eligible for food stamps are not enrolled. This is similar to a national trend with 4 out of 10 eligible people not receiving food stamp benefits. Here in Ohio there are nearly 400,000 people who are eligible for food stamps and not receiving them.

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Several schools in the Columbus area are placing recess before lunch for elementary students. The practice was recently advocated by the Ohio Department of Education, and many districts are putting it to practice with great results. The principal of North Linden Elementary, Lenelle Taylor, says that the greatest benefit has been seeing the calming effects a meal can have on children. She says, “I feel like we’re seeing kids getting settled down quicker and gaining more instructional time.”

Another reported benefit has been that students will finish all of their meals and eat slower if they are not anticipating recess. The benefits have not just been proven through trials in school; there is a fair amount of scientific research that also supports recess before lunch. Katy Wolf, director of medical dietetics at Ohio State University, says that “time and again [research] showed [children] would eat more, drink more of their milk with recess first.”

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