Harvesters is a food bank, which is a centralized food collection and distribution facility that provides food and household products to agencies serving people in need.

In 2009, Harvesters distributed 36.6 million pounds of food and household products in our 26-county service area in northwestern Missouri and northeastern Kansas. As you can imagine, it takes an advanced warehousing operation to collect and distribute that much food every year. Here’s how it works:
  1. Harvesters develops partnerships with growers, processors, manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers and restaurants and encourages them to donate, not dump. Local individuals, businesses, places of worship, schools and civic organizations also donate non-perishable food and household products through community food drives for Harvesters.

  2. Harvesters transports donated food and household products from local donors and from national donors affiliated with Feeding America to our warehouse.

  3. Volunteers assist Harvesters' staff in sorting and repackaging donated items when necessary. Items are stored utilizing safe food handling practices and then distributed to member agencies.

  4. Donations are given to people in need at Harvesters' member agencies, including food pantries, soup kitchens, senior centers, homeless shelters, community kitchens and youth programs.
Harvesters can feed five people for just $1. That kind of efficiency can only come from the central distribution model in which dollars are leveraged to acquire, transport, sort, package, store and distribute donated food.

In addition to providing emergency food assistance, Harvesters is also committed to developing long-term solutions to hunger. As the voice of the hungry in our community, Harvesters takes the lead to educate the general public, local business leaders and all levels of government about hunger and what they can do to help alleviate the problem.