Denton McLane White House Briefing on Feeding School Children During Pandemic

WASHINGTON — The U.S. federal government has begun engaging with private companies in a collaboration with public agencies to continue feeding school children in need after the global Coronavirus pandemic resulted in closing schools throughout the country. Many children and their families depended upon school lunch programs to close the gap between income and necessities, and the closures have put further stress on families living in poverty.

At the White House press briefing on Friday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary, Sonny Perdue, highlighted two private sector initiatives developed to feed grade school students that depended on receiving daily school meals.

The Chairman of Texas-based McLane Global Logistics, Denton McLane, announced that his company would be delivering pre-packaged, shelf-stable meal boxes directly to students’ homes. McLane Global would accomplish this in a cooperative effort with Baylor University’s Collaboration on Hunger, Pepsico, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service.

He referred to the initiative as a significant development for families living in rural America.

Panera Bread’s CEO, Niren Chaudhary, also announced that his company would be launching a partnership with the Children’s Hunger Alliance and the U.S.D.A. to provide boxed lunches to school children across Ohio. He described the program’s goal would to be to offer the program in other states after the initial launch in Ohio.

School districts across the country have been exploring options for continuing school lunch programs amid the stay-at-home lockdowns. Some schools have continued programs by distributing breakfasts and lunches through their school bus fleets, while others have asked households to pick up meal boxes at school facility locations.