URBANA, Ill. — Rising food prices and the termination of pandemic-level benefits for customers of the USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) have increased public demand for assistance from food pantries, which are having a hard time keeping up. In response, a 12-county pilot program that fights food insecurity by matching deer hunters in east-central Illinois with meat processors and food pantries will continue, with hopes other counties and states might follow suit and adopt similar programs. 

This is according to organizers of the University of Illinois Extension’s Illinois Deer Donation Program, which launched in 2022 with support from the Health Equity Achieved Together Project, a multi-disciplinary collaboration with University of Illinois SNAP-Ed. The effort was further supported by the Eastern Illinois Food Bank, Feeding Illinois, Illinois Department of Natural Resources, Whitetails Unlimited and the Illinois Association of Meat Processors.

“The price of food in the last year has been astronomically high, and we were able to provide nourishing food for families in need,” said Caitlin Mellendorf, nutrition and wellness expert for the U of I Extension, during an April 19 webinar detailing results of the first year of the program. Mellendorf said the initiative would continue another year as a pilot program before she hopes to see it expand to other counties across the state. 

“Last year we had six meat processors who (processed venison) that then was inspected by health agencies to ensure the safety of the meat, and those processors provided us with some really great feedback,” Mellendorf said. “We were very thankful to have them. Along with the processors and other partners, we talked to food pantries to gauge their openness to receiving venison. We were diligent in surveying food pantry guests and were pleased to hear that more than 90 percent of the pantries providing data were happy to receive deer meat.”

In all, the six partner meat processors provided 8,413 pounds of meat to 37 food pantries during the first year of the program, which ended in February 2023. A $25,000 family trust donation earmarked for the program helped finance the cost of processing, which was around $100 per carcass.

The Extension and partners reached out to every food pantry within the 12-county pilot area to offer nutrition education to their clients, added Meredith Probst, Extension SNAP educator. “Through that they also received some food safety handouts that explained how to safely store and freeze venison, and how to cook it properly,” Probst said, adding that Extension educators engaged with 483 food pantry participants to distribute over 9,300 venison recipe cards.

Processors who might want to link up with the Illinois Deer Donation Program should first consider whether their facility has the available freezer space to accommodate extra deer carcasses and can process the animals in a timely fashion, noted Mike Love of Morgan’s Meat Market, one of the program’s partner processors. Love added that he was initially hesitant to accept donations of harvested deer (which must be field dressed prior to delivery) without a guarantee the processed meat would be picked up and paid for. 

“When the U of I approached us about this program some of these concerns (surfaced), but I can say it was fantastic and the Extension did a great job hiring individuals to help us with (pick up and delivery),” Love said. 

The 8,143 pounds of donated venison was enough to provide 33,656 meals for families in east central Illinois, according to Michelle Fombelle, Extension SNAP educator. “We had 202 hunters participate in the program,” she said.

For more information on the U of I Extension’s Illinois Deer Donation Program, visit www.extension.illinois.edu/food/deer-donation-program. You can contact Caitlin Mellendorf at chuth2@illinois.edu or via phone at (217) 877-6042.

In support of the program, the U of I Extension has posted ten videos illustrating different venison recipes on its YouTube channel.