Stamp Out Hunger supports food banks

The United States Postal Service need your help to Stamp Out Hunger. The annual food drive is celebrating 20 years, and has grown to the largest single-day national effort benefiting Feeding America .

Stamp Out Hunger is on Saturday, May 12.

You are asked to place a non-perishable food times such as rice, cereal and canned foods into a sturdy bag. Then set the bag next to your mail box on Saturday before your mail is delivered.  The letter carrier will pick up the bags when they deliver the mail on Saturday.

The food is then delivered to food pantries in your area such as Manna Food Pantries in Pensacola.

“This is the single most important food drive in the two counties and will largely determine how well providers will meet the needs of the hungry in the coming months,” said DeDe Flounlacker, Manna Executive Director.

Last year, the national food drive collected more than 72 million pounds of food.

More Americans are depending on food pantries to put food on the table. According to an annual Department of Agriculture survey, the number of American homes without appropriate food resources neared 49 million in 2011 and more than 16 million children (1 in 5) are faced with the prospect of hunger.

The Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive began at the local level in the late 1980s and went nationwide in 1992.

For more information about the annual Stamp Out Hunger food drive visit www.helpstampouthunger.com or www.facebook.com/StampOutHunger , and follow the drive at www.twitter.com/StampOutHunger .