The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is serving free meals to students in North Carolina who were affected by Hurricane Florence.
Students in the disaster area will be able to receive the free meals through Oct. 26. The government says that the meals will potentially benefit 31 districts and more than 284,000 students.
School districts will be able to serve meals that do not follow meal pattern requirements or meal planning through Oct. 19 in order to help administer the meals as effectively as possible.
“During a storm like this, the state may face transportation challenges, or need to divert food inventories to other disaster response efforts,” said USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue in a statement. “We are providing this flexibility to help schools provide wholesome meals to students using the foods they have available.”
The USDA has also allowed The Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina to run its summer meal programs during this time.