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FedEx Celebrates 50th Birthday by Packaging 50,000 Meals

on  May 8, 2023

As FedEx’s 50th birthday approached, its FedEx Cares program set out with a mission — to impact 50 million people around the world by April 17, 2023. FedEx has been working toward this goal since 2019 and announced earlier this year the goal had been met, but the work continued with the 50 Days of Caring leading up to the April 17th birthday— and Rise Against Hunger came along for the 50th celebration with a meal packaging event in Memphis, Tennessee!

At the event in Memphis on April 17, FedEx volunteers worked together to package 50,000 nutritious meals. That’s 1,000 meals packaged to celebrate each year of FedEx!FedEx has worked with Rise Against Hunger since 2014 to support people facing hunger around the world. Over the past nine years, more than 4,800 FedEx volunteers have packaged meals at 81 meal packaging events across the globe. And earlier this year, FedEx surpassed 1 million meals packaged with Rise Against Hunger! FedEx has also supported Rise Against Hunger’s work by providing shipping grants that have enabled us to send over $34 million worth of medicine, sanitary products and supplies since May 2022 to our international partners for the communities we serve.

The meals packaged on April 17, and at other meal packaging events over the past few years, have supported FedEx’s goal of impacting 50 million people through FedEx Cares by its 50th birthday. We’re so honored they collaborated with us and other nonprofits to achieve their incredible 50 by 50 milestone! Thanks, FedEx, for helping create positive change and make the world a better place! Check out more photos from the Memphis event:

If your company is interested in making an impact with Rise Against Hunger (like FedEx did), please fill out the form on our Corporate Partnerships page!

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To find out more about meal packaging and how to organize your own event, fill out the form and a Rise Against Hunger team member will contact you to start planning. If you’ve connected with our team or filled out this form previously, no need to submit it again. A Rise Against Hunger team member will be in touch soon!
 

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About the Author

Strength, Stability And Hope

The gift that filled Nelly’s table.

“We were yielding very little, and the crops could not sustain us the whole year,” Nelly remembers. As a mother of seven and a farmer with two decades of experience, the stress of inconsistent yields was all-consuming. A poor harvest not only strained her family financially, but also limited their own meals to just two a day. Their story reflects that of many in their fishing and farming village near a lake in the Karonga district of northern Malawi. Here, heavy rainfall makes conventional farming methods nearly impossible. The entire village is, quite literally, saturated in food insecurity — a reality that leaves families struggling to survive season after season without a dependable source of nourishment.

In 2019, Nelly began participating in Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience, a sustainable agriculture project implemented by Rise Against Hunger in partnership with the Foundation for Community Support Services (FOCUS). The project works with 3,100 smallholder farmers in Malawi’s Karonga and Mzimba districts to strengthen food and nutrition security by improving production methods, nutrition practices and household income.

Just one year later, Nelly was ready to expand the variety of crops on her farm. What land once only produced maize began to flourish with sesame, cowpeas, rice and groundnuts during the rainy season (summer), as well as maize and vegetables during the dry season (winter). Through climate-smart agriculture training, she learned new techniques like manure making, pit planting and mulching, crop rotation and intercropping. Equipped with these tools, Nelly’s farm began to thrive.

After the 2023–2024 growing season, she sold enough produce to purchase an ox cart. Her harvests in 2024-2025 season yielded over 500 pounds of crops, including 22 bags of groundnuts, seven bags of maize, 12 tins of sesame and three bags of rice. With this surplus, she was able to invest in a motorbike, which she now uses to transport African doughnuts (mandasi) that she cooks and sells — creating yet another source of income for her family.

The transformation reaches far beyond her finances. Nelly now has the stability to provide for her husband and children. “I am able to eat different food types, pay school fees for my children and fulfill the visions that I have made with my family,” she beams. “I am now sleeping peacefully without any fears of food or paying school fees for the children.”

Her leadership has also grown. Today, Nelly serves as a leader in the Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience project, teaching other farmers in her district to adopt climate-resilient, labor-saving practices. By sharing her knowledge, she is multiplying her impact — empowering her neighbors to experience the same transformation she has achieved.

Across Nelly’s community, food and economic security are on the rise. Lombani, a government extension officer for the region, explains, “I can see the community is being transformed in the sense that in the area, there is food, income and nutrition security. Development is also happening at the household level.”

Nelly reflects on what it means to invest in holistic programs that address the root causes of hunger: “We are now healthy people. Children are going to school after eating their breakfast, having high yields and different types of crops due to conservation agriculture practices. With the support from the project, we have food, and we can access other food items from the market after selling our produce.”

This is the gift that fills: a future full of stability, strength and hope. It fills tables with food, families with security and communities with the resources to thrive. It’s an investment in futures rooted in resilience and hope.