Helping Others, One Meal At A Time

On Friday, March 11, 2022, the Hanson Helps Team partnered with Rise Against Hunger to impact the lives of people around the world. Hanson Helps is an internal organization of volunteers at C.H. Hanson dedicated to supporting the company’s employees and “giving back” to people in need – both locally and worldwide.

Beginning at 9:30 AM, three 45-minute shifts of Hanson employees donned hair guards and put on food handling gloves for the task at hand. After being instructed, the volunteers carefully mixed, measured, weighed, and sealed meal bags containing whey protein, rice, and other ingredients.

Participants quickly picked up assembly speed by fine-tuning their processes and jamming to the sound of Parliament’s “Give Up the Funk.” It should be noted here that many of the 90+ volunteers sang along with the “food packing” tunes and occasionally busted a few dance moves.

There were many smiles and a sense of accomplishment when the Rise Against Hunger team struck a large gong indicating we had successfully packed and sealed 1,000 meal bags. The goal was to complete 10,000 food packs... the total count was 10,152.

Rise Against Hunger’s mission is very simple and to the point - to grow a global movement to end hunger. They strive to accomplish this by empowering communities, nourishing lives, and responding to humanitarian crises and emergencies.

The hunger-fighting NPO enlists the help of various packaging volunteers (like the Hanson Helps Team) to produce millions of nutritious meals annually that are distributed to the ends of the earth through Rise Against Hunger’s vast network of partners.

These dedicated partners identify and address the effects of food insecurity based on their local knowledge, presence, and expertise. They ensure the distributed meals are leveraged to change lives. The partner’s efforts provide educational opportunities for children. The result is improved students’ health and nutrition, reduction of gender inequalities, stimulation of economic growth, and elimination of child labor.

Programs to improve agricultural methods, business skills, and provide market access also help provide food. These partner-driven programs increase agricultural production and farming incomes. With valuable training and access to quality seeds and fertilizers, farmers can increase land yields and harvest a wide variety of nutritious crops.

By supporting the establishment of fish and livestock production, Rise Against Hunger also provides pathways to diversifying diets and improving nutritional outcomes. In 2020, they impacted 2.8 million lives in 78 countries. For more information, visit www.riseagainsthunger.org.