Every day in Arizona, about 20 percent of the population goes hungry, said Jerry Brown, spokesman for St. Mary’s Food Bank. That’s one out of every five people.
While those numbers may be daunting, there is a group on campus striving to erase the state’s hunger problem all together. ASU4food is a club that raises awareness about hunger in Arizona and collects monetary and canned food donations.
“There are a lot of needy people here in Arizona who don’t have a consistent source of food,” said Keith Southergill, adviser for ASU4food. “I don’t think a lot of people are really aware of that. The awareness and the advocacy to try to help those people is a key part of ASU4food.”
The club will create a 30-foot long display made of food cans for the University’s homecoming block party on Oct. 29. The display will use 4,500 cans to spell out the word “hunger.”
For every dollar donated, a can will be taken away from the display during the three-hour demonstration called Make Hunger Disappear. The money and food will be donated to St. Mary’s Food Bank and United Food Bank.
“We take down the cans until the word hunger visually disappears,” said ASU4food vice president and biochemistry junior Elana Niren, a participant at last year’s event. “Afterward I find that I’m exhausted but I just love the whole experience … the planning, the executing, counting the cans and seeing how much we had donated.”
The club is sponsored by State Farm, Southergill said, which also sponsors the Territorial Cup competition between ASU and UA. ASU4food competes with UA4food in the annual Territorial Cup Food Fight — a food collection race that coincides with football and basketball games.
Megan Barlow, president of ASU4food and a pre-med biological sciences junior, said the competition with UA helps their cause. The club also holds donation events at the UA football and basketball games, which count toward Territorial Cup Food Fight points as well.
Niren, who also enjoys planning the ASU4food events, said the group expects to raise $3,000 and 5,000 pounds of food during the Make Hunger Disappear event.
“It’s nice to see the benefit in how it helps people,” Niren said.
Reach the reporter at kmmandev@asu.edu
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