St. John's extends curbside food drive for another week

The city of St. John's has collected nearly 60,000 kilogramsof food in a curbside collection, and is extending the drive for one more week to improve on that.

In a news release Friday, the city said the drive is being extended because some residents may have forgotten to put out their donations, or were inadvertently missed.

• #NLFoodDrive launched in St. John's to help fill empty shelves

Since Monday, 59,956 kilograms [132,182 pounds] of non perishable food had been picked up at the curb.

Area 4 residents were the biggest givers, with 14,168 kilograms, followed by areas 5 and 2, with more than 12,000 kilogramseach.

Businesses gave 3,907 kilograms.

Hunger snapshot

The curbside program comes during a week when a national HungerCountsurveyshowed that 25,040 people in Newfoundland and Labrador used food banksin March 2015.

Most users, 71.3 per cent, were on social assistance. More than a third,39.7 per cent, were single.

Another 22.2 percent were single parent families.

Although the numbers are high, the HungerCount report shows that food bank use in the province has dropped 5.9per cent in the past year, and is down 8.1 per cent from 2008.