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Abstract This study develops an integrated delivery assignment and route planning strategy for food banking operations, considering food supply and demand constraints, food item restrictions, and vehicle capacity constraints. A mixed‐integer linear model is formulated to maximize the total demand served and minimize the total travel cost imposed on delivery volunteers. An integrated solution algorithm is developed that includes Lagrangian relaxation and column generation. The algorithm decomposes the problem into assignment and routing components and solves each iteratively. The proposed methodology is applied to a case study in Wake County, NC. A series of sensitivity analyses are conducted to draw insights. The numerical results demonstrate the proposed methodology's capacity to solve complex problems in food delivery operations efficiently. 

Abstract In the United States, food banks play an important role in helping to reduce the rate of food insecurity by distributing donated food among the population in need. One of the challenges that food banks face is to equitably distribute food donations among their clients such that, ideally, each recipient receives the same amount of food. They aim to do so while minimizing waste that occurs due to spoilage and capacity limitations. Perishable food items present specific challenges since they are susceptible to spoilage and need to be distributed before their expiry dates. Based on our longstanding partnership with a large food bank located in the southeastern United States, we present a capacitated, multiperiod, multiproduct network flow model to help them equitably and effectively distribute perishable food donations among the food‐insecure population in their service region. The model is applied within the context of a case study and reveals managerial insights that would be useful to practitioners. Our findings show that although equity is one of the food bank's highest priorities, inequities cannot be eliminated completely. Given the inevitability of inequitable food allocations in practice, this paper provides food banks guidance on how to strategically control inequities using two approaches: (i) by increasing the number of periods for which equity should be satisfied or () by allowing deviations from a perfectly equitable distribution. The results show that modest deviations from perfect equity using either approach can lead to significant improvements in both the quality and quantity of food distributed and can also reduce food waste. While approach () is preferable, the most desirable outcomes occur when both are applied simultaneously. We also find that county capacities inhibit a food bank's ability to achieve balance between equity and effectiveness when distributing perishables. Our framework provides food banks the flexibility to balance the trade‐off between effectiveness and equity based on their preferences. 

Food insecurity is a social and economic condition where an individual or household have difficulty to obtain safe and nutritious food. Food insecurity in America is a serious issue given that more than 30 million people in America are food insecure. The complex nature of the problem cannot be address by federal nutrition assistance programs alone. Non-profit hunger relief organizations also play a significant role. Feeding America is the nation’s largest hunger relief organization and has over 200 affiliated food banks. Those food banks used to focus on providing emergency food assistance, more and more are paying more attention to the needs and preferences of the people they serve and provide culturally relevant food and food that meets the dietary and other health considerations. Working with a local food bank and its affiliated partner agencies, neighbor preference data were collected. An interactive dashboard was developed to allow decision-makers of the food bank to make evidence-based informed decisions in complex hunger relief operations such as food procurement and distribution. 

According to Feeding America, prior to the pandemic, 1 in 5 African-American/Black, 1 in 6 Hispanic, and 1 in 4 Native American households were food insecure compared to 1 in 11 White households. The pandemic is expected to exacerbate these disparities given its disproportionate economic and health impact on historically marginalized racial and ethnic populations. Food banks are non-profit organizations that work to alleviate food insecurity within their service regions by distributing donated food to households in need. Equitable distribution of donated food is an important criteria for food banks. Existing food banking operations literature primarily focus on geographic equity, i.e., where each geographic block of a food bank's service region receives food in proportion to its demand. However, hunger-relief organizations such as food banks are gradually incorporating demography-based equity in their distribution of donated food in light of the disparities that exist within different demographic groups, such as race, age, and religion. However, the notion of demographic equity has not received attention in the food banking operations literature. This study aims to fill in the gap by developing a multi-criteria optimization model to identify optimal distribution policies for a food bank considering a two-dimensional equity criterion, geographic and demographic, in the presence of effectiveness (undistributed food minimization) and efficiency (distribution cost minimization) criteria. We apply the model to our partner food bank's data to (i) explore the trade-off between geographic and demographic equity as a function of effectiveness, and efficiency, and (ii) identify policy insights.