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Food for Life Houston Serving Vegan Meals to Hurricane Survivors

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HELP US HELP TEXAS FLOOD VICTIMS An estimated 21 trillion gallons of rain fell on the Houston area as a result of Hurricane Harvey, causing 51 inches of flooding in the worst hit places and resulting in over 1 million displaced people. Harvey’s devastating flooding brought back tough memories in New Orleans as Tuesday marked the 12th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The death toll in Texas related to Hurricane Harvey rose to at least 37 Thursday morning, CNN reports. The Govinda’s vegetarian restaurant in Houston has been offering 300-400 free vegan meals to victims since the storm hit, however, they are now delivering free vegan meals to area shelters, including 200 hot meals to volunteers at the University of Houston who are doing volunteer service at various shelters. “The shelters don’t have vegan food for volunteers, so we stepped up,” says Shyamasundara, the ISKCON temple president. The temple is also offering spiritual counseling services for those in need and doing kirtan and prayer for the victims of Hurricane Harvey. Food for Life Global is collecting funds on behalf of the vegan food relief. Please donate to sponsor free vegan meals to those in need in Texas. More update coming soon… You can make a difference with a gift to Food for Life Global via our US partner A Well-Fed World. Your donation will help more people become free of hunger. We rely on people like you to help us continue our vital projects, so please do support us.

We are approaching 4 Billion Meals Served

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Since starting as a grassroots project in India in 1974, Food for Life Global has expanded to now include 210 projects in 60 countries serving up to 2 million meals daily. And on December 30th we will hit the 4 Billion Meal mark! “This is truly astonishing,” says Paul Rodney Turner, the director and co-founder of Food for Life Global. “And to think that it is highly probable that FFLG network of affiliates has served even more meals than this is mind boggling.” Yes, the numbers we are using to calculate the current distribution rate and volume over the last 42 years are based on conservative estimates and do not include all projects over history, simply because many projects closed down, many did not maintain accurate logs of meals distributed, and many do not report numbers at all. Since the inspirational “founding” of Hare Krishna Food for Life when the founder/acharya of ISKCON, Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada told his students, “No one should go hungry within 10 miles of our temple,” volunteers have set up projects in more than 60 countries. For the first 19 years of Food for Life’s history, it remained a grassroots operation, with no formal headquarters, training materials, or guidelines. Then in 1993, Turner released the first official Food for Life Training manual that covered all aspects of how to set up, manage, promote, and support a Food for Life project. That same year he left his native country of Australia and began helping volunteers around the world start their own project. Then in 1995, Food for Life Global was officially established in Potomac, MD, USA to serve as the headquarters and training and support office for all Hare Krishna Food for Life projects around the world. Around 2005, Turner released a new book called, […]

Over 500,000 hot meals served to conflict victims in Ukraine

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For the past 2 years (beginning in 11/11/2014), volunteer-based non-profit, Food for Life Donetsk has been feeding the most vulnerable people affected by the armed conflict in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, distributing about 6,000 vegan meals per week. What Food for Life Donetsk is doing Under great duress, Food for Life Donetsk has taken an active role in the life of tens of thousands of people in the Donetsk region, cooking and serving meals to people in Donetsk, Makeyevka, Zugres, Khartsyzsk, Ilovaysk, Zhdanovka and the surrounding villages. To date, more 550,000 hot vegan meals have been served, including over 260,000 liters of vegetable porridge (carrots, cabbage, eggplants, zucchini, pumpkin, etc..) more 600,000 loaves of fresh-baked bread and more 20,000 packaged lunches. Weekly distribution is taking place in the following locations: an urban-type settlement in Gornoe, Khartsyzsk – 800 portions; Khartsyzsk “Metallurg” and the private sector – from 800 portions; Pastuhovka Makeyevka: 1200 portions twice a week. City Clinical Hospital №5 of Makeyevka – 200 meals twice a week; Zugres – 130 portions twice a week; Makeyevka neuropsychiatric boarding school – 200 meals twice a week; Local centers for social services for retirees and lonely disabled citizens of Kalinin, Petrovsky, Kiev, and Kuibyshev district of the Donetsk – 50/100 portions 1-3 times a week; Orphanage Khartsyzsk – fresh baked bread; Food for Life Mariupol – provides hot lunches in local centers for social services of Zhovtneva, Illichivsk, and Ordzhonikidze – 200 meals twice a week. Food for Life Kramatorsk provides the city hospital №2 in Kramatorsk and society of disabled people ” Danko” full hot lunches (130 portions per week). How to support this effort? These efforts will continue as long as the volunteers can fund the cooking and distribution of the meals. Specifically, they are in desperate need of new cooking equipment and a new […]

LA Unity Rally & Global Drum Circle for Peace

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Get ready California! Just days after the election we are uniting with diverse organizations, communities, musicians, drum circles and artists as we rally, march and #drum4peace. The #timeisnow to UNITE! Sunday, November 13 at 12 PM – 5 PM PST Santa Monica City Hall 1685 Main St, Santa Monica, California 90401 Food for Life Global West Coast Rep, Punya Das is the brains and heart behind the drum, dance and pray project that is bringing together people from every demographic to sing, dance and pray for world peace and unity. Food for Life Global will be sharing FREE food/ picnic at Time Is Now Cooperative’s LA Unity Rally this coming Sunday! We are honored to partner with them for this event. The website of the project boldly claims: We are servants of world peace; praying for an end to all wars, hunger, malnutrition, starvation, and homelessness inspiring the development of a pure relationship with Mother Earth. LA locals RSVP bit.ly/ladrum4peace Non-Local and International bit.ly/SyncGlobalDrumCircle LIKE our page and support global unity! Time Is Now Cooperative

Crowdfunding campaign launched to save sanctuary

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Longtime Food for Life Global volunteer, Juliana Castaneda Turner founded and operates the ONLY animal sanctuary in Colombia. She is on a quest to secure a permanent home for the 70 rescued animals under her care, and with this, offering people a chance to invest in an exciting new chapter in the sanctuary’s history. “We absolutely must raise the funds somehow or other to make sure the animals are safe forever”, she explains. “Every donation, even $10 is a huge help.” The project has a real plan for sustainability and we are very excited to share this campaign with you. See campaign here A History of Success Some of the animals we’ve saved include Balaram the bull, whose mother jumped a fence from a dairy farm to come to our land to have him. So from that day, I became his “mother.” This story was featured in The Dodo.  There was also the story of how we saved Pola the pig. She was in a horrible situation being harassed by hungry dogs, but today she is happy at our sanctuary, as nicely reported on by Care2 And then there is the touching story of Bernie the bull calf and Sri Ram the puppy as reported by The Dodo. Also, INSIDE EDITION just did a video report here. PLEASE VISIT THE CAMPAIGN NOW AND GET INVOLVED

The Simple Solution to World Hunger

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Paul Rodney Turner giving a talk

A talk I gave at the cafe 360 to open the Food Surplus Network in Ljubljana, Slovenia in October 2015. To learn more on this see Paul’s article. John Robbins, the author of the best-selling Diet for a New America, writes: “The existence of so much hunger in the world is a reality we cannot deny. It is a reality that challenges us deeply: it asks us to become more fully human.” Robbins argues that the world hunger problem is not only the responsibility of the United Nations, but of every human being on the planet. “When we remember those who are without food,” says Robbins, “something is awakened within us. Our own deeper hunger comes to surface—our hunger to live fully, to bring our lives into alignment with our compassion, to make our lives expressions of our spirits.” Food for Life started in India, after the founder, Swami Prabhupada proclaimed to his yoga students that no one should go hungry within a ten-mile radius of a temple. Since that time, over two billion free plant-based meals have been served to the needy on six continents. Food for Life has emerged as the largest vegan food relief program in the world! Food for Life’s mission—to bring about peaceful and prosperity through the liberal distribution of pure plant-based food prepared with loving intention.

Crowdfunding Campaign Launched to Acquire Mobile Kitchen for FFL Serbia

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Food for Life Global is requesting donations to buy a mobile kitchen for our affiliate in Serbia to distribute more than 60,000 vegan meals over the next 6 months to feed refugees seeking asylum in Serbia.  “We are already serving as the main source of food to many refugees pouring through this country, but we could be so much more effective if we could feed them on the spot,” explained Moksha Rupi, head chef for FFL Serbia. The alarming living conditions of refugees coming to Eastern Europe Since the beginning of 2015, more than 350,000 migrants and refugees have arrived at European borders with unaccompanied children and vulnerable families making up thousands of them. At the risk of their own lives, these men and women flee the war in the Middle East in the hope of offering a better life and a hopeful future to their children. Seeing images of boats capsize on the Mediterranean coast and the distress of migrants trying to reach Europe, we all wonder what we can do to help.  Refugee families need everything from a shelter to warm clothes, medical and psycho-social support. But the first basic need they experience is the lack of food that is suitable for their journey. How Food for Life is directly helping the refugees Since the beginning of refugee influx in Europe, Food for Life is doing everything in its power to answer that need. Since October, FFLG has distributed over 12,000 meals to refugee families throughout several countries (Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, Bosnia & Hercegovina, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, France and the UK). We supply hot plant-based meals freshly cooked the same day and served with love, but also fruits, beverages, and clothing to face the increasing cold. Thanks to our experience and network of volunteers across Europe, we were […]

Food for Life Responds to Floods in Chennai with hot meals

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Chennai has been declared as a national disaster zone and is witnessing its worst crisis in more than 100 years. With a population of 4.6 million affected due to floods caused by heavy rainfall, the city of Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu is in chaos. With no power or easy access to food and water, life in Chennai is harsh. This is the first time in hundred years that Chennai is facing such heavy rainfall. The death toll is approximately 260 with more being discovered daily. The Indian Army has been deployed to rescue people and supply necessities. The flooding has caused enormous financial losses, estimated to be above 2.2 billion dollars. The Hare Krishna temple in Chennai, where Food for Life is based, has suffered immensely as well. Most of the volunteer monks have been shifted out of the temple. The situation is dire and more rainfall could make the situation worse! Jayapataka Swami, the Krishna leader for Chennai and who oversees the Food for Life project in many parts of India, has requested people to pray for Chennai. Despite the massive challenge, Food for Life Chennai is currently supplying daily meals to more 1500 flood-displaced families sheltered in government schools. “We aim to expand the food distribution to more areas in Chennai, along with supplying water and bedsheets,” said local director, Sumithra Krishna. Food for Life Chennai were the first responder to the great Asian tsunami of 2004, providing hot meals the same afternoon the tides crushed over 200,000 people. Eventually, the main relief efforts focused on Sri Lanka. “Food for Life Global has already committed $1000 and we hope to raise more over the next few weeks,” said, director, Paul Rodney Turner. Donate to support Food for Life Chennai Note: Please mark the donation for FFL in […]

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