Qulin Food Pantry Feeding Friends & Neigbors

Qulin Food Pantry has served the area for more than 20 years, and their work continues thanks to grants and donations from many sources.

Volunteers recently received their biggest donation to do date, a $2,500 check from America’s Farmers Grow Communities. The Bayer Fund effort will help provide food for their community.

The pantry has been at its present location in the nutrition center building about five years. Families served each month vary from 70-100. Numbers in each household range from one to 10.

Money to buy food is raised through fundraisers like yard sales, the Christmas bazaar, a booth at the Qulin Homecoming and donations. Donations also come from the USDA food bank.

Volunteers, like Linda McGee, always are looking for money to use in stocking the shelves.

When McGee spotted information about the Bayer Fund, she said, “We are farmers and we just registered on the computer. They have a drawing and they drew out my husband’s name.”

In the letter announcing the donation, America’s Farmers outreach manager for the Bayer Fund, Angela H. Allen, said, “Enclosed is a $2,500 America’s Farmers Grow Communities donation from Bayer Fund, on behalf of Butler County farmer, Jerry McGee. McGee selected your organization to receive this donation through the Grow Communities program.

“The purpose of the Grow Communities program is to partner with farmers to make a positive impact in farm communities across the country by supporting local nonprofit organizations. Since the America’s Farmers program began in 2010, more than $52 million has been directed to organizations across rural America.”

The group will use the money to keep the pantry stocked. Food is ordered each month, and things they cannot order from the food bank, “we go to Save-a-lot and get the rest we need,” one said.

The donations are prepared by the size of the families. One volunteer said, “if someone gets laid off, they may come. We really don’t turn anyone away.”

The 10 volunteers are in their 70s and they proudly say, “we unload the truck every month. We come the third Monday to box the food. We give out food from 8-10:30 a.m. the third Tuesday of each month.”

When families arrive to pick up the food, Carolyn McMeans said, “we have volunteers to work the freezers. The frozen food is packaged according to the size of the family,” and those packages are added to the boxes.

Two men normally carry the food out for people.

“We do deliver to people who cannot get out,” another volunteer said.

To make a donation, call 573-587-3175, leave a donation at the city hall or mail it to Qulin Food Pantry, City of Qulin, P.O. Box 172, Qulin, Mo. 63961.

Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the life science fields of health care and agriculture. Bayer has a more than 150-year history. Subsidiaries include Monsanto, Bayer CropScience LLC and Seminis.