Food For The Poor Welcomes TECO’s New Leadership
COCONUT CREEK, Fla. (April 21, 2023) The new Director General of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Miami visited Food For The Poor (FFTP) on Thursday to reinforce how it is committed to working with the charity to lift families out of poverty.
Director General Charles Chi-Yu Chou, who was joined by Deputy Director General Antonio Fan, participated in a roundtable discussion with FFTP leadership and toured the charity’s Coconut Creek headquarters during the visit.
“What Food For The Poor is doing is really amazing,” Director General Chou said. “Once you build a house for people in need and give them enough food, the most important thing that you are giving people is hope to start a new life. It’s our honor to continue working together in this endeavor.”
FFTP President/CEO Ed Raine said the charity is only able to serve impoverished families with the support of its donors and trusted organizations and partners such as the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Miami (TECO).
“You are a key part,” Raine said. “The rice donations you provide are essential to helping starving families and you support us in so many other ways. We are deeply grateful. You are literally saving lives.”
Last spring, a delegation from TECO visited FFTP to assist the Cao Zhong Zhi Foundation with the generous donation of wheelchairs and orthopedic equipment to help patients in Haiti have a better quality of life.
“We wanted to send this equipment to people in need and we were looking for a good partner to do it,” Director General Chou recalled. “My colleague said, ‘Why not talk to our good friends at Food For The Poor?’ Once we contacted you, it happened right away. Thank you so much for your team. This is a partnership we value and cherish very much.”
TECO’s Miami office is one of 12 offices under the Washington D.C.-based Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, which is under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Miami office was established in 1988.
FFTP has partnered with the Taiwan International Cooperation and Development Fund (ICDF) on numerous projects over the years.
In addition to working with FFTP on emergency relief projects, the Taiwan ICDF has assisted with in-country production of food through agriculture, farm-raised fish and livestock breeding – self-sustaining initiatives that teach people how to earn a living.
For 16 years, the partnership with the Taiwanese government has provided FFTP the opportunity to feed thousands of families and meet its mission to help children and families living in poverty.
Earlier this year, FFTP and the Republic of China (Taiwan) renewed their longstanding annual pledge to provide lifesaving rice to Haiti, where a humanitarian crisis is expected to worsen this year.
FFTP-Haiti will receive 440 tractor-trailer loads of lifesaving rice from the Republic of China (Taiwan) in 2023. The 8,800 metric tons of rice is equal to the same amount as the generous gifts provided in 2022 and 2021, and is 22 percent more than the gift provided in 2020.
Raine said FFTP has evolved in recent years from just providing disaster assistance, building homes and doing the same things to rallying around the theme of doing the right things in the right way, and listening and learning from other organizations and partners.
“We’ve built things. Now we’re trying to build lives,” Raine said. “The partnerships are the only way we will be able to do our best work, because of the subject matter expertise brought in by others who specialize in something. Partners allow us to do more.”
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 17 countries of the Caribbean and Latin America. 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 www.FoodForThePoor.org.
Michael Turnbell
Communications
954-471-0928
[email protected]
