The Foodbank's mission is to provide highly nutritious food to the community's hungry citizens and to ensure that no individual go hungry, not even for a single day. 68% percent of the food recipients are hungry children, 19% are hungry seniors, and 13% to hungry adults. The Foodbank has been providing food to impoverished children, families, and seniors residing in Los Angeles County since 1975, with a dominate focus on the poorest of the poor neighborhoods including downtown Los Angeles, Compton, San Pedro, South Central, Watts, and North Long Beach. The Foodbank solicits wholesome donations of nutritious food from the food industry and channels these products to charitable community organizations supporting low income individuals. The Foodbank of Southern California is a principal front end food provider to hundreds of community-based agencies who feed the hungry children, families and seniors. The Foodbank aids community-based organizations who are independently be unable to handle the logistics of transportation, space and refrigeration. The Foodbank's network receives food for emergency and non-emergency food programs such as shelters for abused children and women, crises centers, day care centers for children and seniors, senior centers, emergency box programs, soup kitchens, and food pantries. The agency is a vital link in the continuum of care that facilitates the needs of low-income people in our community. There are over 700 community-based agencies in The Foodbank's network. The small agencies may each feed 20 to 50 people, 5 days a week, while the larger agencies may each feed up to 1,500 people, 1 to 5 days each week. Hunger exists in every corner of Los Angeles County, exacting a physical, psychological, social and economic to afflicted children, families, and seniors. Unfortunately, the demand for emergency food assistance in Los Angeles County has increased every year during The Foodbank's 35-year history. Despite the growth in provision of services, as a feeding agency, The Foodbank is faced with providing increased service delivery to more people than was ever anticipated. Meanwhile, there is a continuous decrease in the already limited government support to transport and distribute food to our disadvantaged constituency. Impoverished families typically have enough money for only one week worth of food for the entire month. A U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics study found that an average American family spends 13 percent of their income on food. For a family of five, with an income of $22,000, after taxes, this would leave them with $178 for their monthly food budget. That's just a little more than a dollar a day per person. In contrast, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's most conservative suggested food budget, The Thrifty Food Plan, proposes that a family of this size should be spending at least $149 a week on food. The Living Wage project, based out of Penn State University, believes that number should be even higher. According to their formula, a family of this size should have a weekly food budget of $172.

“The Foodbank’s mission is to provide basic sustenance and proper nutrition to the community’s hungry citizens and to ensure that no individual go hungry, not even for a single day.”