Pine Bluff community working to end food insecurity following new USDA report

PINE BLUFF, Ark. – New statistics released by the US Department of Agriculture show the number of Arkansans facing food insecurity is going up.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, almost 19% of Arkansans don’t know where their next meal is coming from. This number is up from about 16.6% in 2023.

The report blames the rise in inflation, rise in the cost of living and fewer federal assistance programs.

“It makes my heart bleed,” Delta Network Food Bank founder Jacqueline Ross said.

Nearly 20 years after founding the Delta Network Food Bank in Pine Bluff, Ross said it’s upsetting to know that Arkansas is the hungriest state in the nation.

Ross said she has seen the need every day since she started her organization back in 2005.

Delta Network Food Bank serves 17 counties in the state including Jefferson, Lincoln, Crittenden, Desha, Chicot, Pulaski, Ouachita, Union, Calhoun, Arkansas, Conway, Bradley, Clark, Monroe, Phillips, Grant and Drew Counties.

“I’ve seen them ride across town on bicycles and leave her with a bicycle loaded down with food trying to make it back across town to give to their families,” Ross said.

She also said she’s seen a man “walk from Star City to Pine Bluff” to get food.

Across town in Pine Bluff on Alabama Street is the Grow Something Challenge Community Gardens.

Obrennan Moss founded the Grow Something Challenge gardens in 2017 and since then has grown over 80 types of fruits and vegetables.

“I had been growing food in my backyard and I wanted to expand that so other people could do it for themselves,” Moss said.

He said GSC has “used some of everything to show people they can grow” their own food.

While working on this mission, he said “we’ve had people come up and say I need something I’m hungry,” which is why he said he began inviting people to the garden off the streets to lend them goods.

If he isn’t handing them out, he’s teaching people how produce on their own.

One of the key factors for the GSC is to “waste nothing.” Moss teaches people how to grow food using things such as milk crates because not everyone has a backyard.

“It’s very imperative that we try to fill in some of those gaps,” he said.

If you’d like to reach out to GSC you can reach out on their Facebook group GSC Community Gardens .

Those who’d like to donate to the Delta Food Network can call 501-804-6253 to speak with founder Jacqueline Ross.

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