Imagine the pain of hearing your children cry themselves to sleep at night because they are hungry. It’s a sound that would quickly drown out the growls coming from your own empty stomach. It’s a sound that is heard far too often by millions of parents right here in America. Hunger in America is not limited to the few homeless men you might see on downtown street corners – although it certainly plagues them. The truth is an estimated 31 million Americans do not know where their next meal will come from -- that figure includes 12 million children. It also includes hundreds of thousands of senior citizens whose fixed incomes don’t go very far. Many of the elderly resort to eating dog food or moldy bread. All this while nutritious food rots in fields or is thrown away because there are not enough ways to get it to those who need it most.

Hunger takes it’s insidious toll on millions men, women and children in other countries as well. It robs the energy of Central and South American orphans. It wastes elderly men and women in Eastern Europe trying to live on less than $20 pension a month. It subject infants and children in Asia to chronic disease as their little bodies breakdown from malnutrition. It kills thousands in famine stricken regions like southeastern Africa who experience the slow and painful effects of starvation. Hunger must be stopped!

Operation Blessing is hard at work every day in the fight against hunger. Together we can gain even greater ground, please join us!

Operation Blessing addresses the hunger crisis in America by being the critical link between food producers and our hungry neighbors. Using our fleet of Hunger Strike Force trucks and a huge network of local helping agencies we deliver good and other essential to keep pantries and stomachs full. Internationally we provide nutritious meals to orphans, the elderly, and others facing food shortages. In addition we look for the best ways to avert hunger in the future like helping provide vegetable seed and livestock to insure secure food sources for them in the months and years to come.

In the USA Operation Blessing is driving away hunger a truckload at a time. Every day our Hunger Strike Force trucks are on the road transporting food and other essentials to food pantries, soup kitchens, and hungry families so they can end their search for food and focus energy on changing their situation. We also have teams working on hunger issues in other countries.

The Hunger Strike Force (HSF)
fleet of tractor-trailers is used to pick up millions of pounds of donated food, nutritious supplements and other essentials. When food producers, businesses, corporations or others offer these generous donations our HSF trucks can quickly transport them items to those in need across the United States or to a port for shipment overseas. The HSF trucks are positioned throughout the country with distribution centers on both east and west coast for optimal coverage and speedy response. Once donations are picked-up loads are taken to a site where they can be reconfigured and dispatched with a variety of donated food and relief supplies to communities all around the country. The HSF also supports our Medical Services, Disaster Relief and Bless-A-Child programs for maximize efficiency in all we do.

Community Food Distributions
Several times throughout the year we join forces with our on-going outreach or corporate partners to host Community Festivals in at-risk neighborhoods across the United States. We survey the area to find the best location, where trucks, volunteers and guests can have a safe, fun meeting. On the day of the event, the Hunger Strike Force brings in tractor-trailer loads of food, basic necessities, and needed supplies. Often times other community social service agencies come out and supply things like health screenings. Hundreds of volunteers from civic organizations, church groups and businesses help fill up and give out thousands of bags of groceries. This is a wonderful opportunity for companies to help hungry people in their local area and provide employees with a great way to volunteer as a team.

Another aspect of these community food distributions is when professional sports’ teams like the Baltimore Ravens and the Carolina Panthers partner with Operation Blessing in bringing food to their hungry fans.

In addition, active Operation Blessing outreach centers and community networks regularly distribute food. They feed hundreds of thousands of children and adults every year!

Feeding Programs
At Operation Blessing we also sponsor several soup kitchens operating in countries including Romania and Ukraine. Working with local agencies, churches and volunteers we give daily nourishment to hundreds elderly men and women who can barely survive on small pensions. Without the soup kitchen’s help, these people would go days without eating.

In addition, we send containers filled with nonperishable food items overseas. Our international outreach centers rely on these shipments as they care for orphans, street children and desperately poor families. Many orphanages and school lunch programs are able to make a balanced meal using these nonperishable food items.

Food Security
Giving food to the hungry is good, but it only solves their problem one meal at a time. The problem is keeping food on the table. One of the ways Operation Blessing addresses long-term hunger relief is by providing vegetable and other crop seeds to poor communities.

You can join us in giving someone a healthy tomorrow! Somewhere in the world our outreach centers are serving a hot meal or giving a bag of groceries to hungry families and individuals every day. Your generous gift of $25 can help feed a hungry American family of four for one entire month! When's the last time your grocery bill was $25? A donation of $1,000 can feed 100 elderly Romanians or Ukrainians in OBI sponsored soup kitchens for one month. That's just 50 cents a meal! And don't forget, your organization's excess food products can also help feed the world's hungry. No gift is too small or too big in breaking the vicious cycle of hunger.