The Canadian Foodgrains Bank is
celebrating its 40th birthday this month of helping hungry people
around the world.
It was started by the Mennonite
Central Committee (MCC) in Winnipeg and has expanded to become the most
ecumenical Christian organization in North America, spanning denominations from
Mennonite and Baptist to Roman Catholic and Salvation Army.
The first call put out by the MCC
brought in 1,442 tonnes of grain from farmers in Manitoba and Saskatchewan and
the grain went to India.
Today the 15 partner organizations
attract donations from farmers, urbanites, churches, businesses, the Canadian
government, and others from coast-to-coast. More than one million people in 40 countries were helped in fiscal 2015-16.
Corny Petkau, 72, was involved in
that first collection of grain. He remembers driving from farm to farm in
southern Manitoba, sticking his augur into grain bins and auguring out bushels
of grain.
“I was glad to be a small part of
that beginning,” he says. “We knew it was going where it was needed.”
Donating grain was also personal for
Petkau, whose father emigrated from Russia in 1926.
“He was helped to get started in his
new country, Canada, and he passed along to his children the message that we
also needed to whatever we could to help others,” Petkau says.
Once collected, the grain was taken
to Rosenort Seeds, owned by brothers Ben and Jake Friesen, where it was
cleaned, processed and bagged before being loaded into a boxcar.
“When were asked, we were glad to
offer our services,” says Ben of how he and Jake, now deceased, provided the
services of their company to the first grain gathering effort.
“We were happy to be part of it,
never realizing how big it would grow. We just wanted to do something to help.”
Ben, 78, is now retired but still
involved with the Foodgrains Bank through the Scratching River Growing Project.
So is Petkau, who is part of the Living Grains Growing Project.
The projects are an idea that became
popular, especially in Ontario where rural and urban congregations joined to
plant mainly corn or soybeans, usually on donated land. Supply companies often
conated fertilizers, seeds and pesticides.
Harvest time is often a co-ordinated
effort of farmers, grain companies and the urban and rural congregations who
come together to celebrate what they will be giving to feed needy people.
Donors can give to any one of the 15
partner organizations who put the grain or money into their “account” at the
bank. Donors can also give to the Canadian Foodgrains Bank itself.
When disaster strikes, such as
drought in East Africa, a partner organization working in a country in that
area can draw from its account. Others can choose to lend support from their
accounts.
Volunteers are drawn from the member
churches to provide project supervision and liaison for relief efforts.
The Canadian Foodgrains Bank works
better than many global agencies which work with governments, too often resulting
in frustrating bureaucracy and corruption.
The Canadian Foodgrains Bank bypasses
those bureaucratic structures to put resources directly into the stricken
communities.
