COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — As thousands of people flee Ukraine, people in the states want to help but sometimes do not know what to do when a conflict is so far away.
Since Russia launched its invasion last week, nearly 700,000 people have fled Ukraine for neighboring countries. The UN expects up to 4 million refugees in the comings weeks.
As the tragedy unfolds, World Central Kitchen is serving fresh hot meals to fleeing families.
The nonprofit’s mission is simple: get hot food into hands.
The organization stresses the power of a local hot meal for those fleeing their homeland because of the invasion and for those who made the tough decision to stay to defend their country’s land.
“When someone is in crisis and going through something so traumatic, just being fed even, if it is a moment of relief, it’s such a powerful thing,” Food & Drink Editor for Colorado Springs Independent Mark Schniper said. “People cooking and eating together is one of the most human things we could do.”
Schniper co-founded a Facebook group called Culinary Distancing Colorado Springs to support local restaurants and bars during the pandemic. But now the group is spreading the word about a more distant mission.
“World Central Kitchen dispatches all over when there’s anything from cyclones, hurricanes, floods, they go into any disaster areas and now conflict areas as well and do relief work and feed people,” Schniper explained.
The organization has locations at eight different border crossings in Poland. It is also helping in Romania, Moldova, Hungary, and Slovakia while supporting local restaurants in five Ukrainian cities.
“They are actually buying local ingredients, and local distribution lines in those zones to create the economy and bring it back,” Schniper said. “It’s kind of a secondary mission too, hot meals in hands now stay there work with folks on the ground and support them and keep working in the other ways that are kind peripheral to the initial cause but still have a great benefit.”
With the power of social media, people can now see how their money is helping refugees.
“I feel pretty confident what we give them is going to quickly to use with based on the high numbers of people fleeing right now out of Ukraine into those neighboring countries,” Schniper said.
If you would like to donate to World Central Kitchen, click here. If you would like to follow the organization’s efforts in Ukraine, follow #ChefsforUkraine.
