Can Do

Last weekend my younger sister and I peeled the wilting and loose leaves off otherwise good cabbage alongside fellow volunteers at the Greater Chicago Food Depository. After the cabbage was packed into produce boxes, it was ready to be delivered to neighborhood pantries, soup kitchens, and shelters.

Through its programs and member agencies, Chicago's food bank helps feed close to a half million people a year, a third of whom are children. Research collected by the GCFD and America's Second Harvest reveal more about the sobering number of people going hungry. Among the people served through Chicago area agencies only about 10% are homeless, 39% of households receiving food had at least one employed adult, and many more have to choose between buying food or paying for rent/mortgage, medicine, and/or utilities.

Relief from the daunting problem of hunger poses challenges on a scale that even the impressive structures created by architects, engineers, and designers for Canstruction exhibits across the United States and Canada can only begin to address. The giant structures are made entirely of canned goods which are then donated to food banks-- making Canstruction a wonderful testament to the power of design.