In its continued effort to support the community, Mosaic Company and Feeding America Tampa Bay (FATB) have once again joined forces by making the holidays a bit more festive for students and faculty at Gibsonton Elementary School last month.
“Many parents are facing the challenge of providing daily meals for their children that usually get subsidized at school,” said Mosaic spokesperson and Feeding America Foundation chair, Christine Smith. “To help ease that concern, the Mosaic Company donated $15,000 to Feeding America Tampa Bay to provide a holiday meal for 700 students who attend Gibsonton Elementary School.”
Ready for the challenge of distributing all of the meals in an orderly and efficient way, 20 Mosaic employees, along with FATB staff, were readily available to volunteer their time to get the job done at the school located at 7723 Gibsonton Dr. Each meal-bag or holiday food box included all the makings of a holiday dinner, including ham, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, green beans, sweet potatoes, stuffing and gravy. FATB serves a food-insecure population of close to 700,000 residents across West Central Florida, 250,000 of which are children struggling with hunger.
In a press release, Mosaic Company officials explained that with a per capita household income of just over $20,000, 84 percent of the Gibsonton area’s families are considered economically disadvantaged and that close to 30 percent of the school’s students don’t speak English at home, another challenge for the students. “Without the continued assistance of Mosaic and Feeding America Tampa Bay, many of our families would go without a nutritious meal during the holiday season and every weekend of the year,” said Gibsonton Elementary School Principal, Amber Statham.
Mosaic invests annually in organizations focused on hunger relief, agricultural research and development, water conservation and stewardship and community enrichment. “Our partnership with the school and Feeding America Tampa Bay is an effort to overcome hunger at a grassroots level and will hopefully make the holidays a little brighter for these families who struggle to put food on the table all year long,” said Gary N. “Bo” Davis, Senior Vice President of Phosphate Operations at Mosaic.
For information about Feeding America Tampa Bay, visit www.feedingamericatampabay.org.
For more information about Mosaic, visit www.mosaicco.com.
