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Ponoka is making a difference in the lives of hungry people overseas.
Join us in this exciting Christian response to hunger. A new crop year is ahead of us and we look ahead with hope and optimism; as do the hungry people we have helped. With food, they can start building for a better future.
We are the Ponoka Community Growing Project (PCGP), the local arm of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank. This year we celebrate our 20th year of fighting world hunger. The history of our project’s success has been a testament to tremendous community support.
It all starts with a dedicate team of delegates who come together to plan and organize all that goes into each step of growing and marketing the crop. We are blessed to have the continued commitment from the landowner who rents the land to the PCGP year after year.
Each year local businesses donate their products including herbicides and fertilizers, seed and equipment, and insurance. Many people in the community make cash donations directly to the PCGP or through their churches.
Most outstanding of all the community support is how local farmers, their spouses, sons and daughters contribute to the production of the crop each year. Donations of time and equipment begin with the spreading of manure, then working the field in preparation for seeding.
It should be noted that local farmers have donated chicken manure from their own farms; this is a valuable resource and does contribute to the great crop yields that we have seen over the years. They are there to seed the crop and later to spray the field.
There are those who monitor the crop’s progression all through the summer. In the fall local farmers return to swath the crop and on the day of harvest it is delightful to see the arrival of several combines, tractors and grains carts, and trucks all to take the 165 acres of crop off in an afternoon.
The 2016 crop was marketed in February this year and we were able to contribute $104,500 to the Canadian Foodgrains bank. We (the PCGP) are glad to know that the work of many hands resulted in this significant contribution to the goal of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank to End World Hunger.
Money from the project goes to people in Somalia and Zimbabwe
Every contribution — no matter the size — can mean hope for thousands in the developing world. In places where individual purchasing power is often less than one Canadian dollar a day, your donation makes a big difference.