Making nutritious food accessible is an organizational-priority for IRUSA all across the world, including in the US. IRUSA volunteers, also known as Blueshirts, come together to pack food boxes with essential food items like oil, sugar, pasta, dates, tea, and more, so that families can boost their pantry staples. IRUSA Blueshirts pack dry food meals as well, so that families can prepare their own nutrient-dense meals when they want. In 2023, IRUSA’s Volunteer Management Office innovated a basmati-rice meal with custom flavors to accommodate families originally from the Middle East and South Asia, including refugee families.
IRUSA’s Assistant Director of Volunteer Engagement at the time, Said Durrah, elaborated on the significance of these IR-exclusive meals: “There’s never been a meal like this that, with its spices and ingredients, can be turned into Kabuli pulao, Maqlooba, or many other cultural dishes. These basmati-rice meals can be enjoyed without adding other ingredients, but the beauty of a supplemental meal is that you can add your own favorite protein to the mix. And what makes it even more special is that it was built out of love and community. Volunteers from different cultures, ages, and backgrounds served as a taste-testing focus group. We wanted to work, as a community, to create a meal that we would be proud to serve at our own dinner tables, so that we know those we serve would like it and feel seen and understood. We wanted it to be a spoonful of home that someone can reach for in their new home pantry. We have a duty of custodianship and care, and of serving our sisters and brothers in a dignified way, and, so, that’s what we did.” More than 247,968 of these basmati rice meals were packed by volunteers in 2023.
Many of these meals, as well as the food boxes, are distributed before and during Ramadan so that families have food for the month. Additional seasonal food distributions, like those during the Qurbani season, further work to provide nutrition, in the form of halal meat protein, that families may otherwise not be able to eat all year! Halal turkeys distributed each November have a similar effect, and bring critical nutrients to vulnerable families who may otherwise have to go without. In November 2023, more than 26,000 halal turkeys were distributed, with the help of some 50 community groups, serving more than 100,000 neighbors in need.
Beyond the seasonal distributions, the IRUSA family brings food staples and fresh food to vulnerable neighbors throughout the year, including through our Hot Meal programs in IL, MI, and NY, and meal pack and food box deliveries throughout the country. This, coupled with our related advocacy efforts, centers the need for more equitable and permanent solutions to fair food accessibility.
In February 2023, IRUSA’s Senior Advisor for Advocacy and Government Affairs, Jihad Saleh, was a panelist at the Bread for the World “An Interfaith Voice on Hunger: The 2023 Farm Bill”
According to IRUSA intern Qudsia Saeed, “The panelist[s] addressed the Farm Bill in relation to their faith backgrounds and moral considerations, highlighting the need to move beyond mere kindness toward justice and collective responsibility. They acknowledged that charitable sectors and humanitarian aid are simply a bandage, naming that, ‘we will never food bank our way to a hunger-free world.’” Instead, they emphasized the need to center and prioritize policy as a long-term solution. And that is why IRUSA, while providing immediate food aid to help quell urgent hunger, works with community groups to develop longer-term, sustainable solutions that help individuals get the resources they need to thrive independently.
