Missing Meals Report Key Findings:
- Minnesotans are missing 125 million meals every year
- 125 million missed meals per year averages out to two week’s worth of dinners per month per person in need
- By percentage, Traverse County has the greatest need, with 21 percent of meals missed (313,000)
- Annual missing meals for the seven metro counties are: Anoka—3.90 mm meals missed (10.24 percent); Carver—1.09 mm meals missed (14.27 percent); Dakota—4.53 mm meals missed (11.72 percent); Hennepin—13.6 mm meals missed (6.12 percent); Ramsey—13.28 mm meals missed (10.45 percent); Scott—908,000 meals missed (9.54 percent); Washington—2.28 mm meals missed (12.24 percent)
- On average, low-income Minnesotans in the seven county metro area miss eight percent of their meals, four percent lower than the state average of 12 percent
- The Missing Meals report looked at all 87 Minnesota counties
- Minnesotans in need provide for 61 percent of their own meals
- 22 percent of meals for Minnesotans in need come through federal nutrition programs, such as food stamps or school lunch programs
- Minnesotans in need receive only five percent of their meals from non-profit sources
- The average cost per meal for a household of three is $2.32
- There are an estimated 956,000 low-income men, women and children in Minnesota
- For its Missing Meals report, Second Harvest Heartland defines low-income as people in households with income <185 percent of federal poverty (adjusted for household size)
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