The Gold that Feed’s the World

Riding my bike in the Prairies of Manitoba's countryside this weekend I was astonished over the miles and miles of grain growing as fare as the eye could see. The color of the grain so golden and healthy. I was wondering what this fields of grain would look like growing in countries were peoples are starving. My heart felled weighted down and unsettled questioning what I was doing to help and what Canada was doing as a whole for hungry people in third world countries.

6 million children under the age of five die each year as a result of hunger. One in seven children born in countries where hunger is most common will die before age five. Most of these children are not victims of famine that so dominates our news, but suffer from what the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) calls a “covert famine” of chronic hunger and malnutrition stunting growth, sapping energy and potential.

850 million people are undernourished — nearly three quarters of them living in rural farming communities. That’s about equal to the entire population of the Western Hemisphere. (Bread for the World/Population Reference Bureau)

What is Canada doing!
ERDO’s annual Growing Projects are supported by the PAOC family and many other caring friends who want to respond to the enormous problem of world hunger. In the face of over 800 million people in our world living with hunger and poverty every day, do you sometimes ask yourself how can we possibly do something that will make a difference? What can we do to have an impact when the needs are so great and urgent?

The Growing projects, based mainly in the Tisdale and Wakaw areas of Saskatchewan, provide the opportunity for investment, productivity and volunteerism. In 2007 up to 20 quarter sections (160 acres each), supervised by ERDO, will be farmed by volunteer teams from across Canada. The harvested crops are later sold, producing resources that can be directed through the Canadian Food grains Bank (CFGB) into food aid programs that ensure that hungry families and communities receive life-sustaining food as well as the supplies and tools to grow their own crops.

$10,000 provides the input costs (fuel and supplies) for Growing Projects to farm a quarter section of land (160 acres) which will feed approximately 5,000 people or 1,000 families per year when combined with matching government funds
$400 provides one tonne of grain that feeds 2,500 hungry people one meal for one day
$250 can feed a family of five for three months
$62.50 directed to ERDO’s Growing Projects provides input costs for one acre of land which will feed 32 people for one year or six families