Thirsty Acres

Thirsty Acres

Thirsty Acres. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Line On Agriculture.
This is the week that we start making plans for our Thanksgiving feast and while Thanksgiving is for many people a day to indulge themselves, many others have very little or no food. And that is where Don Butcher has been led. His Thirsty Acres Ministry and Agape Food Bank have been providing extra food to the hungry.

BUTCHER: Agape Food Bank is run by some of us farmers and for the last 15 years we’ve been giving food all over the world, shipping food to Russia, two years ago we donated a whole semi load of food –apples, potatoes and onions, we donated a whole semi load of food and it went to fire victims in Southern California by San Diego.

Butcher says they work in tandem with other groups and companies like sending a load of onions to a Canadian processor.

BUTCHER: They take product that’s got a blemish on it and they take care of it and they dry it. Last year they produced 5-million meals that they shipped to Christian organizations to the starving people of the world. It’s such a blessing.

Butcher says his driving force is a bible scripture.

BUTCHER: My mission statement (is) Isaiah 58: 10, 11 & 12. And this particular part of it is the food part but it says in that scripture if you will help feed the hungry and help the hurting, God will bless you in almost every way. First of all he’ll give you health, he’ll make your darkness turn to light and so I can tell you that at 79 I feel like I’m 39 and you think it could be true.

They are always on the lookout for food products and in many cases use a group of people called gleaners to go into fields after a normal harvest is done to pick up any left-overs. Butcher says in one instance he had a large amount of wheat in storage.

BUTCHER: People found out in Portland and there’s a program that shipped it to the church of my choice in Russia. Every one of those containers went to the church of my choice in Russia which I knew because the gleaners in my orchards are Russians and they told me.

They are looking for pretty much any kind of commodity from vegetables to grains. If you are interested in donating either time or food products, contact Butcher at 509-488-2136.

That’s today’s Line On Agriculture. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.

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