Passage Two
Next week, as millions of families gather for their Thanksgiving feasts, many other Americans will go without. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, more than 12 million households lack enough food for everyone in their family at some time during the year-including holidays.
Hunger is surprisingly widespread in our country-one of the world’s wealthiest-yet the government estimates that we waste almost 100 billion pounds of food each year, more than one-quarter of our total supply.
Reducing this improper distribution of resources is a goal of America’s Second Harvest, the nation’s largest domestic hunger-relief organization. Last year, it distributed nearly 2 billion pounds of food to more than 23 million people in need.
America’s Second Harvest is a network of 214 inter-connected food banks and other organizations that gather food from growers, processors, grocery stores and restaurants. In turn, the network distributes food to some 50,000 soup kitchens, homeless shelters and old people’s centers in every county of every state.
A great deal of work is involved in distributing tons of food from thousand of donors(捐赠)to hundreds of small, nonprofit organizations. Until a few years ago, America’s Second Harvest lacked any effective way to manage their inventory. Without accurate and timely information, soup kitchens were sometimes empty while food was left to spoil in loading places.
In 2000, America’s Second Harvest began to use a new inventory and financial-management system-Ceres. It is software designed specifically for hunger-relief operations. It is used by more than 100 America’s Second Harvest organizations to track food from donation to distribution.
Ceres has helped reduce the spoiling of food and improve distribution. An evaluation found that the software streamlined food banks’ operations by 23 percent in the first year alone.
With more accurate and timely reports, Ceres saves time, flees staff members to focus on finding new donors, and promises more efficient use of donations.
Hunger in America remains a troubling social problem. Technology alone cannot solve it. But in the hands of organizations such as America’s Second Harvest, it is a powerful tool that is helping to make a difference-and helping more Americans to join in the feast.