In southern Illinois, over 45,000 people are considered food insecure. Toni Kay Wright, U of I Extension Educator says the problem is widespread.
"Those are our families and our friends and our neighbors, in all of our communities."
Wright says part of the problem is food pantries sometimes don't have the staff to pick up donated food.
"We've heard food pantries, if they've needed to go pick up food, from a store, or a donation site, they don't have the vehicle or the volunteers to go get that food."
Recently leaders from education and other stakeholders held a summit to brainstorm on ways to fight the problem.
Wright says many good solutions came from it including a pilot project where imperfect produce that Rendleman Orchards can't sell to big stores, referred to as Grade 2 fruit, will be sold to the Tri-State Food bank.
