Food pantries serve populations with high rates of chronic disease and thus may be ideal settings for community-based health promotion programs. This study aimed to describe the readiness of food pantry organizations (n = 69) and their personnel (n = 129) to engage in nutrition-focused food pantry services, including nutrition education and the application of dietary guidelines for disease prevention and management as components of existing food assistance programs. Among survey respondents, few personnel reported asking clients about chronic disease diagnoses or providing clients with nutrition education, and over half reported lower confidence in performing these activities. Yet, the majority were interested in training to address client health needs. However, organizational capacity is currently restricted by lack of nutrition policies and limited healthy food inventory, including fruits and vegetables. To address the nutritional needs of clients, food pantries may benefit from in-person training and additional resources to obtain and distribute healthier foods.
Food banks (FBs) and their partner agencies play important food access roles in nearly every US community. While FB missions have historically emphasized hunger alleviation, stakeholders are increasingly expressing interest in leveraging these community assets to promote health. We conducted semi-structured interviews with US FB executives (n=30) to explore their perspectives on the evolving role of FBs in community health, and how these perspectives relate to organizational efforts to distribute healthier foods, including fruits and vegetables (F&V). All but one executive reported actively working to increase F&V distribution; however, fewer executives had implemented nutrition policies. Executives reporting higher F&V distribution more often described health as central to their organization's mission and perceived charitable food program clients as being at high risk for chronic disease. FB leadership recognition of health and hunger as interrelated community issues may have direct implications for FB strategic planning, distribution practices, and policies related to F&V.
This qualitative study describes opportunities and challenges to produce recovery identified by food banking executive leadership across the US (n = 33). Identified challenges included regional variation in fresh produce availability, long transportation times, and lack of refrigerated storage. Opportunities included high client demand for fresh produce, internal benchmarks for fresh produce distribution, and organizational partnerships to create regional sourcing and distribution efficiencies. This research indicates the need for cross-sector collaboration and planning efforts across the agricultural, health, and charitable feeding sectors in order to best recover and redistribute fresh produce.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.