Food For the Poor 2023 Annual Report Highlights Strategic Plan and a Year of Achievement
COCONUT CREEK, Fla. (May 22, 2024) – Food For The Poor (FFTP), one of the largest international relief and development organizations in the United States, provided more than $417 million in aid in 2023, thanks to the generous support of its donors.
Included in the charity’s newly released 2023 Annual Report, the total support of cash and donated goods enabled FFTP to remain steadfast in its mission to provide relief, recovery, and resilience to help impoverished families in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The charity’s Annual Report highlights its 2024-2026 Strategic Plan, which is summarized in “SHARPEN,” the theme of its focus on refining its approach and enhancing programs that will bring greater efficiency and efficacy in fulfilling its mission. The charity’s five primary goals in the strategic plan include maximizing fundraising efficiency, shifting toward building lives rather than building things, sharpening program delivery, elevating accountability for stronger stewardship, and enhancing capacity and capabilities.
“We are not just focusing on growth for growth’s sake,” said Ed Raine, President/CEO of FFTP. “Our goal is to put improvements into place to ensure sustainability in the communities we serve and, as a result, transform the lives of the people who live and work in those communities.”
To achieve its goals, the charity has invested in capacity building and partnered with innovative organizations that share its philosophy. Together with its partners, FFTP is providing the necessary tools and training to empower people to permanently lift themselves out of poverty.
Highlights of the Annual Report include:
• Purposeful Projects: During 2023, the charity forged new partnerships and strengthened existing alliances by working with an array of organizations, such as Light a Single Candle, the World Food Programme, and Acceso. All are focused on developing advanced programming that drives community transformation and sustainable community development. Projects include providing training and support for farmers in Haiti, Colombia, and El Salvador that will help farmers boost their yields, while giving children and families access to locally produced food.
• Family Food Kits Program: More than 65 volunteers donated time each week at the FFTP headquarters in Coconut Creek, Fla., during 2023 to pack 17,600 kits, each containing enough food to feed an average family of four for one week. Each kit contains parboiled rice, corn meal, pasta, canned tuna, canned beans, and canned fruits and vegetables, with the total packed providing 70,500 meals. Corporate groups, including Royal Caribbean, American Express, Perigon, Insperity, The Keyes Company, Sam’s Club, Texas Roadhouse, Blue Realty, and Community Capital Management, participated by sending teams to the FFTP headquarters to pack kits.
• Emergency Preparedness and Response: FFTP provided relief for thousands of people in Haiti’s central region where torrential rains flooded streets and ruined crops in June 2023. By pre-positioning relief kits in advance of storms, the charity was able to quickly respond with assistance. Between June and September, FFTP shipped 18 containers of relief supplies to Haiti, including family food kits to feed 56,000 people, disaster hygiene kits to help 10,000 people, pre-positioned disaster kits to support 500 people, and enough medical emergency kits to help 14,000 people for three months.
• Collaboration With Water Mission in Turkey, Syria and Mexico: Immediately after the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, FFTP teamed with longtime partner Water Mission to install three water treatment systems to provide 10,000 gallons of treated water a day, supplying the daily water needs of 5,000 people. The two charities also began collaborating in Mexico to provide 10 communities in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas to provide access to water and sanitation over the next five years. Work has already begun on a customized water, treatment, and distribution system that will reach more than 2,900 residents in El Fortín and El Puentes Margaritas.
• Hispanic Outreach: In 2023, Emmy Award-winning sports journalist and TV presenter Elizabeth Pérez extended her support to FFTP’s new initiative aimed at building stronger connections with Spanish-speaking communities to help children living in poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean. FFTP also launched several Spanish-language radio fundraising initiatives to galvanize support and build a spirit of unity with Hispanic listeners.
• Sustainable Community Development: With the help of generous donors and in collaboration with implementing partner CEPUDO, 76 families moved into new homes in the Los Achiotes sustainable community development in Honduras.
• Opportunities for Young People: “Generating Opportunities For Enterprising Youth,” a new project created with trusted partner Entreculturas, will provide educational and income-generating opportunities for 2,900 at-risk youth in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. The project follows a three-fold plan that aims to foster economic opportunities, facilitate educational pathways, and promote the development of a generation of youths committed to social transformation.
• Shipment of Essential Aid: In 2023, FFTP shipped 2,528 tractor-trailer loads of essential goods, valued at more than $360 million, providing much-needed equipment and resources to Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as disaster relief to communities within the United States.
Click here to see the entire FFTP 2023 Annual Report.
Food For The Poor, one of the largest international relief and development organizations in the nation, does much more than feed millions of hungry children and families living in poverty primarily in 15 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. This interdenominational Christian ministry provides emergency relief assistance, water, medicine, educational materials, homes, support for vulnerable children, care for the aged, skills training and micro-enterprise development assistance. For more information, please visit foodforthepoor.org.
Ernestine Williams
Communications
305-321-7342
[email protected]
