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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Food Bank has begun to create an infrastructure to identify, track and distribute culturally responsive foods across the state.
The program will be first piloted in Salt Lake County to enhance the food bank's effort to better understand and serve diverse food needs. Salt Lake County has the largest minority population in the state at 369,156 people, with nearly half of the people of color in the state living in the county.
"We have been always cognizant of food insecurity, of hunger. What has changed for us in our state, over the last probably 10 years, is our refugee population. A lot of new cultures are making Utah home. They have come from very long distances to a place that's totally new for them," said Ginette Bott, Utah Food Bank president.
"And for places like Utah Food Bank, we are an emergency food assistance network; whatever comes in that's donated is exactly what goes out. During COVID-19, we learned that some of those things weren't appropriate and weren't a good match," she continued.
Utah has long recognized itself as a welcoming state for refugees, with data from the Refugee Processing Center indicating that the state has welcomed just over 8,500 refugees since 2012. When adjusted for population size, Utah ranks 11th for refugees accepted per capita.
Top countries of origin for some of Utah's refugees over the past decade include: the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Iraq and Myanmar (formerly Burma). Foods typically seen in food banks across the state like cereal or prepackaged foods may present a barrier to those from different cultural backgrounds.
"I think we were kind of surprised when we heard stories about families not understanding what to do with a box of cereal, or not understanding how to use an oven, or how do you measure specific quantities of a food," said Bott, recalling a story of a refugee mother who discovered a plastic Frisbee in a cereal box. "She thought that was some sort of a serving mechanism so the kids were getting a Frisbee full of Cheerios. You don't ever think about those things because we take for granted the things that we know."
The disparities and changing needs began to more clearly emerge during the pandemic. Amid an increased need and uncertainty, the Utah Food Bank created new methods to deliver food — from delivery trucks to neighborhood food boxes.
"We tried any kind of method we could think of to get the product that was being requested to the neighborhood who requested it. What we didn't understand are some of those cultures and how they go about acquiring the food they use. Do they have transportation? Do they walk to a store? Do they have a specific market? There were all kinds of things that we learned about during COVID that we didn't really understand," said Bott.
Now as those questions have become more clear, so has a path forward. The Utah Food Bank will be updating its software, tracking systems and warehouse space, and increasing staff and adding additional equipment to better track the different foods needed in Salt Lake County neighborhoods through a $10,000 grant provided by KeyBank.
"The Utah Food Bank is celebrating 120 years of service in the state. So it's very apparent that hunger is not going away but hunger is changing. As our population changes, as the cultures change, Utah Food Bank has to be able to change as well," said Bott. "As each brick and mortar pantry see their audience change, they need to let the Utah Food Bank know that as well. Collaboratively, we have to be prepared."
