Tyson Foods, Inc. (NYSE:TSN – News) and Lift Up America teamed up with the Chicago Bulls and other professional and college sports programs to donate 33 truckloads of Tyson chicken to help restock the shelves at Feeding America’s affiliate food banks across the nation.
“Our food banks are calling us every day, telling us that demand for emergency food is higher than it has ever been in our history,” says Vicki Escarra, president and CEO of Feeding America. “They are serving a significant number of new clients–people who were once their donors, middle class workers who can no longer make ends meet, many of the half-million people who have lost their jobs in just the past two months as unemployment has climbed.”
The goodwill delivery tour to fight hunger kicked off at 3:30 p.m. on December 1 in the parking lot of the United Center, where Bulls players and mascot Benny the Bull assisted in donating a truckload of food to the Greater Chicago Food Depository, one of the 200 members of the Feeding America food bank network.
Starting in Chicago, the 1 million pound donation to Feeding America affiliate food banks across the United States will be delivered within the next two weeks.
“We’ve continued in the fight against hunger in this country for nearly a decade now and we’re hearing the call from across the nation,” says Dick Bond, president and CEO of Tyson Foods. “At Tyson our goal is to support families through food donations and to encourage other companies and individuals to identify ways they can share resources and make an impact in the fight against hunger.”
“Lift Up America is proud of the partnership and team spirit between these great organizations,” says Dave Hannah, CEO of Lift Up America. “It is important, especially this time of year, that every company, and individual, identifies ways that they can give back.”
This is the fifth year in which Tyson has partnered with Lift Up America and its network of professional and college sports teams to distribute food and create awareness of the issue of hunger.
