Volunteers pack nearly 50,000 meals for starving children

Ken Walker scooped rice and crushed soybean into a funnel, part of a well-oiled machine.

She watched as her husband, Justin, and 7-year-old son, Jaden, worked next to her, weighing the bags that she filled.

"I'm doing this for him," Walker said, motioning to Jaden. "It's cool to show him volunteering and why this is important."

Walker and her family volunteered on Saturday morning at the Feed My Starving Children Mobile Pack event. Feed My Starving Children is a Christian nonprofit that provides meals for malnourished children. This is the ninth year the Mobile Pack event has been held in Grand Forks, said event co-chair Jodie Storhaug.

The event started on Friday afternoon at Minnkota Power. The goal is to pack 400,000 meals by Sunday evening.

Volunteers sporting hair nets scooped ingredients into bags, weighed the bags and then sealed them. The bags were then boxed up and moved onto a pallet, later to be loaded into a semi-truck by other volunteers.

Each bag contains rice, soy, vegetables and vitamins, said Feed My Starving Children staff member Lana Thomas.

"The meals are scientifically formulated to help kids who are malnourished," Thomas said.

"He's started to get curious, 'well why are these kids hungry?'" Walker said of her son. "And I have to explain that a lot of kids aren't privileged like we are here. It's really cool to show him this and see him experience it."

Storhaug said she will find out where the food is going in about two weeks. In the past, food has been shipped to Haiti, Nicaragua and the Philippines.

By the end of the first shift on Saturday morning, volunteers had packed nearly 50,000 meals.

"That's enough for 136 kids to have a meal for a year," Thomas said.

By the end of the day on Sunday, Storhaug said, Grand Forks will have packed 3.5 million meals in nine years.

"It is so rewarding to know that someone gets food because of us," said volunteer Ken Johnson.

Johnson said he has been participating since the event started. On Saturday, he was manning the soy station, refilling bins on each table.

"Every year, I do a different job and you get to meet new people every year," he said. "And there's good camaraderie because we've all got the same goal, we all want to help others."

Throughout the weekend, the Mobile Pack event will see about 2,000 volunteers, some coming from as far away as Roseau or Aneta.

Storhaug said the group is about 60 volunteers short for Sunday morning's event.

For more information on the event or to sign up for a volunteer slot, visit the Feed My Starving Children website.

1/2: Amy Jacobson pours a cup of crushed soy into a funnel as Angie Gietzen holds the packet that will provide 6 meals during the event Saturday at Minnkota Power. Eric Hylden / Grand Forks Herald

2/2: Volunteers pose for a photo at the end of their shift Saturday. Eric Hylden / Grand Forks Herald