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Volunteers can thousands of pounds of meat for charity
KALONA — Volunteers spent Thursday and Friday canning roughly 17,000 lbs. of poultry through an event in Kalona organized by the Iowa Mennonite Central Committee.
The setup involves a truck-pulled "mobile cannery“ which participants used to pack and prepare roughly 11,150 cans of protein in just a few days. The product, along with cans from other drives across the Midwest, is bound for destinations across the planet, with this year’s recipient list including Ethiopia, Cuba, Ukraine and Zambia.
“All the meat that was canned here last year was used in a refugee camp in Ethiopia for children from 1-5 years old who needed extra protein,” MCC Central States Director of Donor Relations Maynard Knepp said. “In Ukraine, it’s used in Zaporozhye to feed disabled and elderly people that can’t leave the violence, so there’s a food line set up.”
Knepp said it was an intrinsically rewarding experience to those involved.
“It’s a significant financial contribution, and contribution from people who show up and volunteer, to make a difference in a place that they’ll never see,” he said. “They’re giving without any expectation of anything in return. It’s simply giving because we feel we are asked to give to those who are in need.”
The donated food can make a world of difference to its recipients.
MCC East Coast Puerto Rico Program Manager Carlos Arce said the cans help with recovery efforts in the region after hurricanes hit.
“Within a day or two, we can meet the needs of families whose homes are lost or flooded,” he said in The Canner Times, a newsletter made to promote the program. “If hurricane season comes and goes and meat and other items are left, we can give them to the churches with whom we partner, who provide them to families in need … one can of meat can feed a family for one full day, and for some, it might be their only protein for that day.”
Southeast Iowa MCC Meat Canning Chairman Wes Rinner said he considered the project worthwhile as well, despite never having traveled overseas himself.
The all-volunteer effort can be tricky to round up help for, but Rinner said it was doable each year, perhaps “by the grace of God.”
“We invite anybody to come help or donate money or whatever, we don’t close the doors to anybody,” he said. “If you know anything about Mennonites, they run everything by volunteer, pretty much. It always has been hard to get guys to do it, but they always seem to manage to pull it off.”
The 17,000 pounds of chicken were acquired through a broker in Missouri this year, according to Rinner, all of it shipped to the Kalona Maintenance Building, where the mobile cannery was set up.
Those participating formed a long assembly line to crank out thousands of cans per day from the building. The first group stood shoulder to shoulder at a station packing meat into the cans, alongside others who sealed the containers shut. Then, they were passed to a table of people to dry the steam-covered metal off before rolling the product further down the line for a quality check, labeling, and packaging.
By Thursday afternoon, the group had found its rhythm and was making good time.
“We’re running a little bit ahead of time, actually,” Rinner said, a little over halfway through the first day of canning.
To Rinner’s knowledge, the massive device is the only one of its kind. Kalona is its only stop in Iowa this year: a schedule provided by MCC says the trailer is bound next for Freeport, Illinois, followed by several cities in Indiana, then a mix between Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York.
Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com
