FLANDREAU, S.D. (KELO) — It’s important to help others, especially during a pandemic. For Craig Severtson, founder of “Helping Kids Round First,” helping others means packing thousands of meals for people in Nicaragua.

“The project here that we’re doing, buying bulk food–rice, soy, vitamins and minerals and vegetables,” Severtson said. “Normally you’d have 1,000 people coming in, in shifts over a day or two days, but with COVID we can’t do that. So we’re taking the long, slow, steady process. Just don’t stop. 15 people come in the morning, the next morning, and the next morning and the next morning.”

Helping Kids Round First packed 145,000 meals that are being sent to Nicaragua in a container.

“It’s a conscious choice that we’re in Nicaragua because it’s the poorest country in Latin America,” Severtson said. “We go where the need is the most. Who can use it the most.”

This non-profit started by sending baseball equipment, then later agricultural products and medical supplies.

“We’re in a lot of places in the country, but with the virus, everything changed,” Severtson said. “Now we ship money, a lot of it, for emergencies, for COVID supplies and food, and now we’re shipping food.”

This first container is on the road and should arrive in Nicaragua later this month, but they plan to send more. That’s why they need volunteers.

“A cup of soy flour, one small cup of carrot vegetables, one small cup of vitamins and minerals and a chicken broth and then lastly, it ‘s most important, the rice,” Severtson said.

Valerie Parlsey is proud to be a part of this project.

“I think we’re called to be servants. Not only from a religious perspective, but from a humanistic perspective,” she said. “We are supposed to help one another and this is one the many many ways we can do that.”

If you would like to volunteer or find more information about the organization, go to the Helping Kids Round First website.