Students raise $3,700 for food bank

By Susan Anderson

The University of Calgary commerce undergraduate society held their annual Hunt for Hunger on Oct. 2, raising $3,695 in cash and 377 food donations for the Calgary Interfaith Food Bank.

There were 21 volunteers who also helped the day to be a success.

“I thought it was awesome,” said Calgary Interfaith Food Bank development coordinator Julie Brewster. “Students are participating in the community more and more.”

Every dollar the food bank receives provides four dollars worth of food through the group’s buying power with producers, food donations and guaranteed content in hampers. This includes milk, eggs and groundbeef that need to be purchased by the food bank, not donated to it.

The food bank, an organization solely funded by donors, is currently giving out around 200 emergency hampers a day. Over 70 per cent of these go to the working poor ­– families that have at least one source of income but are facing a crisis and can’t make ends meet.

“Of the 124,000 Calgarians that we helped last year, 41 per cent were children,” said Brewster. “Very few clients are chronic, it’s really for emergencies.”

The Hunt for Hunger featured an Amazing Race style competition where teams of four people ran around Calgary competing in different challenges.

The race is open to anyone and teams must have at least $200 in donations to enter although some teams managed to bring in between $800-$900.