The Hunger Action 2016 campaign is under way in Indiana and across the nation. In Indiana, more than one million people struggle with hunger and may not know where they’ll find their next meal. That number includes one in five kids who may not have enough to eat. Emily Weikert Bryant from Feeding Indiana’s Hungry says September is a great month for the annual campaign because the holidays are just around the corner, and that’s when a lot of people tend to donate, but there are people in need now.
Indiana is the 18th highest-ranking state when it comes to hunger. Nearly 15 percent of Indiana households are food insecure. Just over 6 percent of those are very food insecure, meaning they are skipping meals on a regular basis because they can’t afford to buy food.
The idea of the campaign is to get everyone to help and Weikert Bryant says there are several ways to do that. People can volunteer at shelters or food pantries, they can donate food, or they can participate in programs such as those at local grocery stores where they may be asked to round up to the nearest dollar, with the extra change going to the food banks.
There’s good and bad news when it comes to hunger in America. On the plus side, the numbers dropped from 2014 to 2015. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service says the rate declined from 15-point-4 to 13-point-4 percent. The bad news is still more than 42-point-2 million Americans lived in households that were struggling against hunger last year.