MLB Together, Rise Against Hunger collaborate to send meals around the world

LAS VEGAS -- Earlier this week, MLB Together and Rise Against Hunger collaborated at the MLB Fall Meetings to provide meals to people in need of food across the globe.

“It’s awesome when we are even at a business [event to be] we are able to do this,” senior manager for community affairs for the Colorado Rockies and volunteer David Beckel said. “That’s what we are all supposed to be about in our community development -- to give back to the community.”

Rise Against Hunger has been partnering with Major League Baseball for eight years and, in collaboration, has packaged over 70,000 dry meals for children and families in need worldwide.

“MLB Together is our platform where we work off the field to make change in communities,” April Brown, MLB’s senior vice president of social responsibility, said. “We are here in Las Vegas. We are bringing together over 100 volunteers to volunteer with Rise Against Hunger, a partner with MLB Together.”

At the event, the volunteers from across the league worked together to package nonperishable dry meals to ship to impoverished areas and places where disasters have hit. Each dry pack of donated food is enough to feed a family of five.

MLB Together on Tuesday gave the community members a full day of programming and offered them the opportunity to participate in the Rise Against Hunger event.

“The mission of all of our clubs is to work off the field within their own communities,” Brown said. “For all of us to come together in one location and make it our priority to give back under MLB Together is a true passion.”

“Any time we can get all the clubs together that are trying to reach the same goal -- which is to use baseball to make a positive difference in the community, hearing best practices and also being able to give back here -- is awesome,” said Beckel, who has also volunteered at Rise Against Hunger events in Colorado.

The packages that Beckel and the MLB Together team are making have an impact worldwide. Each dry pack of donated food is enough to feed a family of five.

Reaching 100,000 meals packed since their partnership, meals that will help feed a half-million people -- is a milestone MLB Together and Rise Against Hunger were closing in on at the Fall Meetings.

“I feel like I have a small role in it but to see a number that large and know if we pack as many as they say we are going to, that is going to keep kids fed for an entire year,” Beckel said.

The 100,000 meals MLB Together and Rise Against Hunger send globally will help feed half a million people.

Rise Against Hunger, with the help of Major League Baseball and volunteers from across the world, hopes to end world hunger by 2030.

“It’s the power of baseball working off the field to make change around the globe,” Brown said.