Migrant Workers and Food Insecurity – Minnesota

The face of hunger: Migrant workers in southern Minn., By Julie Siple, July 12, 2011, Minnesota Public Radio: “Every year, workers from the Rio Grande Valley of Texas gather their children and clothes and drive 1,500 miles to Minnesota, in an annual migration that spans generations. Most will head for the vegetable processing plants sprinkled across southern Minnesota, where they work for a handful of companies, including Seneca Foods Corp. They process peas and corn and other vegetables that wind up on your grocery store shelf. A number of the workers arrive with almost nothing, having spent the money they made the year before. That brings many to the Salvation Army Montgomery Food Shelf, 50 miles south of the Twin Cities metropolitan area, where their numbers are a challenge for volunteers…”