Storing & Shipping Food

[Ken]

Now here's a technique that we could use for food shipping and storage preps.


"A (New York) Post story published yesterday said welfare recipients in New York City are buying groceries with EBT cards and packing them in giant barrels, which are sold in grocery stores, to ship to relatives overseas, mainly in the Caribbean. Similar barrels are for sale in some Boston supermarkets."

EBT Users May Be Shipping Food

http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion..._shipping_food


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[Cast-Iron]

And to think for a moment I thought I had heard it all. I've got no problem with folks getting a job and helping out family, wherever that family may be. I do have an issue with benefits derived from my tax dollars being used for this purpose. If these are resident aliens or undocumented aliens I say send them home and permanently bar them from returning to the US. A one strike and you're out policy!

[Rick]

I find that one a bit hard to believe. The USDA and Customs are pretty observant on food items entering and leaving the country. I would think if that were any level of problem they would have already found it. Especially something that large. The customs departments in the receiving countries and certainly islands that are territories to U.S., France, U.K., Netherlands and others would seize them upon arrival.

[Cast-Iron]

I find that one a bit hard to believe. The USDA and Customs are pretty observant on food items entering and leaving the country. I would think if that were any level of problem they would have already found it. Especially something that large. The customs departments in the receiving countries and certainly islands that are territories to U.S., France, U.K., Netherlands and others would seize them upon arrival.

In a perfect world perhaps. Just like our hardened borders has stopped the flow of illegal drugs north and billions in ill gotten narcotics proceeds from flowing south. Come spend a little time near the border. It may not be as porous as it once was, but it is still far from secure. Furthermore, it has been reported that little cargo receives the scrutiny it warrants because doing so would cause too much disruption to the flow of goods.

[Rick]

You just don't have a warm fuzzy for anything in this life do you? I suppose all those concerns apply to all other countries as well since those shipments would be inbound to them. Do a google and look at what's been seized. Jeepers.

[MamaBear]

This kind of thing makes my blood boil. I'm all about helping others when they need it, to get back on their feet. However I cannot stand subsidizing laziness. There are so many people who have made a lifestyle out of living on welfare and handouts from others, it's sickening. I live in an area that has a lot of refugees, and I also managed government subsidized housing for one miserable year. Not only do people blatantly take advantage of programs like food stamps, gov't housing, etc, but most of the people I encountered in my job who were on welfare acted as though they were entitled to it and were owed more. They all walked around in leather coats, with smartphones in their hand, newer vehicles, living in nice subsidized townhomes, and it was never enough.

[Cast-Iron]

You just don't have a warm fuzzy for anything in this life do you? I suppose all those concerns apply to all other countries as well since those shipments would be inbound to them. Do a google and look at what's been seized. Jeepers.

You can Google to see what has been seized, but without knowing what was missed you don't have any real perspective so what's your point? Fact: Despite the billions we spend to interdict drugs, there are still no shortages of them on Main Street, USA. What do warm fuzzies have to do with reality? If I want warm fuzzies I'll tune in the Disney channel.

[Rick]

Here you go. Uncinch you knickers a notch. Enjoy life a little.

http://disneychannel.disney.com/

[Solar Geek]

Ok just to really irritate us all, here at the source of the above article is a linked article about Americans eating gourmet on food stamps.

Here are some excerpts:
Magida, a 30-year-old art school graduate, had been installing museum exhibits for a living until the recession caused arts funding — and her usual gigs — to dry up. She applied for food stamps last summer, and since then she’s used her $150 in monthly benefits for things like fresh produce, raw honey and fresh-squeezed juices from markets near her house in the neighborhood of Hampden, and soy meat alternatives and gourmet ice cream from a Whole Foods a few miles away.

“I’m eating better than I ever have before,” she told me. “Even with food stamps, it’s not like I’m living large, but it helps.”

Mak, 31, grew up in Westchester, graduated from the University of Chicago and toiled in publishing in New York during his 20s before moving to Baltimore last year with a meager part-time blogging job and prospects for little else. About half of his friends in Baltimore have been getting food stamps since the economy toppled, so he decided to give it a try; to his delight, he qualified for $200 a month.

“I’m sort of a foodie, and I’m not going to do the ‘living off ramen’ thing,” he said, fondly remembering a recent meal he’d prepared of roasted rabbit with butter, tarragon and sweet potatoes. “I used to think that you could only get processed food and government cheese on food stamps, but it’s great that you can get anything.”

Think of it as the effect of a grinding recession crossed with the epicurean tastes of young people as obsessed with food as previous generations were with music and sex. Faced with lingering unemployment, 20- and 30-somethings with college degrees and foodie standards are shaking off old taboos about who should get government assistance and discovering that government benefits can indeed be used for just about anything edible, including wild-caught fish, organic asparagus and triple-crème cheese."
http://www.salon.com/2010/03/16/hips...tamps_pinched/

THEN how the barrels being shipped to the Carribbean really started. BUt this was 1969 not today and they were not using food stamps.

http://marcellaveneziale.journalism....-george-irish/

Why did barrel shipping from the U. S. to the Caribbean develop?

Because of growth in population here since 1965, there’s so many more people committed to sending that the shipping industry in the Caribbean community blossomed. In those barrels you could have a variety of things. What the people back home look forward to first of all is food stuff.

What are the most popular items to ship?

One of the things children looked forward to was cornflakes. You’re used to your cereal being flour, corn, rice, arrowroot. So when a barrel came and it had a couple boxes of cornflakes, it was a major delicacy. They looked forward to canned meats like salmon, hams. In that barrel you’d also get clothing, because you used the clothing for tighter packing. Occasionally they would get toys. Or school supplies. Because here you can get a pack of pencils for 99 cents. These things became highly prized commodities because over there you have to pay much more for them.