How to Implement a Simple Family Food Storage Plan in Case of Crisis

Whether during a bad storm or the end of times, there could be a few days in your lifetime where food and supplies will not be available to you and your family. This situation is difficult to imagine, but if you have young children or very old family members, the level of discomfort and anxiety without provisions might be the difference in survival, let alone comfort and security.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

1. Decide how long a period a food storage supply should last. You don’t have to start out with a year’s supply. It is better to balance your requirements and establish a complete survival agenda than just to have a lot of food around. Probably the biggest mistake is to lay in a year’s supply of dehydrated food in boxes. Nobody even knows if you could live off this stuff for a sustained period of time. Dehydrated food without water and fuel to cook achieves little. The best plan is to accumulate the food and supplies you actually use and rotate your supply as you use it. About a 3-month supply is a good start.
2. Determine where you will store the food. A nice pantry is a good idea. If you have the means, you could build or convert a special room, optimally underground like a root cellar with two-foot thick walls, waterproof, controlled access, impervious to rodents and insects. This room needs to keep constant humidity and temperature in all seasons, preferably dry and between 55 and 75 degrees, even when the electricity is off. If you can’t get the storage facility to work, there’s little point in having very much food around. Dried food such as grains and beans usually brings its own infestation in the form of insect eggs. All you need is a little extra warmth and some time to suddenly have little bugs everywhere, corrupting both what they come in on and everything around it that’s not canned or bottled. This room can also serve for supply storage of nonfood items and as a wine cellar.
3. Join a Sam’s Club, Costco or other large wholesale club. These kinds of stores are about the only places you can easily purchase case quantities of food for reduced prices without having to order in advance. Plus you’ll find you are able to save money on purchases conveniently. You will be able to buy much, if not most, of your food for a storage program here.
4. Begin to buy cases of vegetables, cereal, syrup, flour, sugar, oil, canned meats, dried fruits, pasta, sauces, mixes, condiments as well as spices and everything else you use on a regular basis. It won’t take many trips to the store to lay in a 3-month supply. Don’t forget the paper goods too. Juices and prepackaged drinks are a good idea as well.
5. Make sure you have enough water. There are many ways to store water, so use more than one. If you have a well, make sure you have a manual pump or a well bucket to draw water out. Some 55-gallon covered barrels are a good way to store water and they can be used to collect run-off from a metal roof on your garage or tool shed. There are several very efficient gravity water filtering devices you can get, both the charcoal-filter pitchers and the camping variety. If you can locate 5-gallon glass water bottles, that is the best way to store, but 1-gallon glass bottles also work well. Avoid any kind of plastic as even the hard plastic leaches toxic elements into the water. A 3-month supply of drinking and cooking water is probably around 75 to 100 gallons for a family of four, but this doesn’t include bathing and cleaning.
6. In addition to food and water, you'll need fuel. An LP gas-fired grill is essential. You will need to accumulate additional gas containers, so plan on having at least three full ones around all the time. Also, you will need to have several lanterns and fuel for them as well as replacement wicks. You can never have too many candles, so store as many of them as you can. Last but not least, you will need matches. Buy them by the case, and also have other media that will create fire.
7. Continually review your storage plan and everything you have stored. Maintain an ongoing list and always add and revise. Containers sometimes break or develop leaks, so not only do you lose your storage of that item, but huge messes result.