Tyson Foods and the Central Missouri Food Bank have cooked up a juicy deal to help feed the hungry.
Tyson foods will deliver a donation of about 36,000 pounds of chicken to the food bank today.
“It’s actually premium-grade chicken,” said Kristyn Wright, marketing coordinator for the food bank. “It’s the kind you’d buy at the grocery store.”
Wright said the Tyson plant in Sedalia won the chicken in a company contest. They balked at the idea of keeping it to themselves, so they chose to donate the meat — which is enough for around 96,000 meals.
Since 2000, when Tyson foods began aligning itself with local and national hunger relief organizations, the company has donated 39 million pounds of meat, which is enough protein for 156 million meals, according to a news release from the company.
Wright said Central Missouri Food Bank serves 80,000 meals each month and will distribute some of the chicken to other agencies in the state.
“It will go pretty quickly,” Wright said. “It definitely won’t take too long.”