Every year, the Partners in Mission Food Bank in Kingston, Ont., holds its annual food blitz. But like most events, the COVID-19 pandemic has hit the annual food drive hard.
The need for food hasn’t gone away, but the method of collecting it has changed. It was always a very common sight around this time of year to see people collecting food, either going door to door or setting up drop-off bins outside various grocery stores.
COVID-19, however, has once again forced a change, according to the food bank’s executive director, Dan Irwin.
“Unfortunately due to COVID lockdown, we’ve had to cancel our food blitz for the second year in a row,” Irwin said.
“This year we’re going to try to do an online fundraiser and accept cheques of course, too, to help fundraise to pay for the food we normally get donated.”
Moving online to a virtual food drive, this year’s goal is $50,000 — money that Irwin says will definitely help.
“In 2020 we provided 11,600-plus hampers for Kingston, which is over 4,100 adults and over 1,600 kids that were helped by us last year. And so we just want to make sure that we’ll be able to continue that,” Irwin said.
“We were also able to share with our meal providing partners in town — Lunch by George, St Vinney’s, Martha’s Table, Lionhearts — another 32,000 pounds of food that we had in excess that we could share with them.”
Those who wish to donate can do so online by visiting kingstonfoodbank.ca.