Foodbank App Needed for Food Insecurity

I had an idea that kept me from sleeping..well if that darn cat had not woke me up at 415am to be let out, I probably would not have had the idea.

The idea was spurned by the morning news yesterday when I heard an actor(oh, Lizzie says it was Al Roker of the Today Show)  talking about a campaign to reduce “food insecurity“  and hunger.

What is Food Insecurity?

If you go to the previous link and check out the page on Frac.org (Food Research and Action Center) you can find out more about the political terms used to describe hunger in countries such as the United States.

In the United States and other developed countries, people generally don’t starve death, but homes that are food insecure, where there is just not enough to eat, do exist. This isn’t like I didn’t have enough time to get to the store, its more like, I don’t have enough money for the bills on a regular basis, and my family is frequently with out food.

Who are the Hungry?

• kids
• elderly
• homeless
• the continually growing number of unemployed.

Being with out food, and having to skip meals on a regular basis, can seriously affect a persons emotional and mental well being.  Don’t believe it, why don’t you fast for a day, and see how you feel?

As a former teacher, I know that kids who don’t get the proper nutrition, are prone to lower academic achievement, not to mention affects on their physical growth milestones.

So….

What can I do about hunger and Food Insecurity?

I was thinking of  some ways that I could raise funds or food that could be donated to the local food bank. These include:

1. weekly donations to the food bank at church.
2. when we have a party or get together, have guests bring a can of food to donate, this will be brought to either the local food bank, or to church the following week to be added to my weekly food donation.
3. Here is where my idea starts..When we go out to eat(Thegrubhound and FatladySingz eat out a lot) I will start donating either a fixed amount like 5-10$ or a fixed percent like 10% of the bill. If I can give a wait staff 20% then, why not add 10% for the hungry?

So how do I go about getting the money to the food bank. Sure I can keep a tally of the amounts on my phone, and then purchase a grocery store shopping card for the amount next week. Or….

An App to Make Donating to Food Banks Simple

What if there was an app that let me donate a designated amount to the local food bank. The Food Bank App would be like a directory of all the food banks across this globe.  When I pay my bill, I can send the 10% right to the account of a local participating food bank.

The App could be made social, maybe even partner with Social Sites like FourSquare, Facebook, Twitter, and the like.

So I when I donate, a tweet or post could go out that a patron of Joe’s Tavern,  made a donation to the abc food bank…Possible App Customizations:

• The app could be customized to update social sites or to not update them.
• Users could set it up to donate via a set amount or a percent.
• Restaurants could have pages and the total amounts that were donated by patrons could be listed.
• Users could also keep track of their donations, and donation receipts for tax purposes could be issued from it as well.
• Like FourSquare, users could earn awards or badges for how much they donate.
• Those wishing to donate anonymously could opt to not get rewards and to not check in on social sites.
• Lizzie and others have said an option to enable restaurants to match donations could be added.

So what do you think about the Food Bank App idea? How do I proceed?

Written by Pixelhead on March 20th, 2011 with 75 comments.
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