With food assistance benefits set to run out starting Saturday, DoorDash has launched what it calls an “emergency food response” to help people in need.
In a Sunday release, the food delivery service said it would waive merchant fees for food banks, food pantries and community organizations with whom it partners, impacting an estimated 1 million meals next month.
DoorDash added it is waiving delivery and service fees for roughly 300,000 grocery orders for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients next month and will be donating food and essentials to food banks around the country.
“No one should go hungry in America — period,” Max Rettig, DoorDash’s vice president and global head of public policy, said in the release. “Millions of families are worried right now about how they’ll put food on the table.”
“Fighting hunger is core to our mission at DoorDash, and we’re stepping up alongside leading grocers and retailers to help bridge the gap,” Rettig added. “We know this is a stopgap, not a solution. But doing nothing simply isn’t an option.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which administers SNAP, has warned that more than 40 million low-income beneficiaries will not receive the estimated $8 billion they are scheduled to collect in November.
While the USDA has between $5 billion and $6 billion in SNAP contingency funding, it said in a Friday memo that the money can only be used for unforeseen events, such as natural disasters.
The memo, first reported by Axios, contradicts a since-deleted shutdown plan the USDA published on Sept. 30. The plan says that “congressional intent is evident” that SNAP benefits should be allocated during the shutdown using the contingency funding.
The federal government shares the cost of administering SNAP with states, while states operate their own programs. Multiple states, including Texas, Florida and New York, have warned about the impending lapse in SNAP benefits.
