A community effort spearheaded by Pine Grove Baptist Church in East Rockingham was able to collect enough food Saturday for Haitian earthquake victims to feed a village of 400 people for a month.

The week-long effort, dubbed “Buckets Of Hope” was part of a larger project underwritten by the North Carolina Baptist Men’s organization.

Complete buckets included two five-pound bags of long grain enriched rice, one 48-ounce plastic bottle of cooking oil, two 2-pound bags of dry red or black beans, one 5-pound bag of all-purpose flour, one 20-ounce cylinder container of granulated white sugar, two 1-pound boxes of spaghetti noodles, one 40-ounce jar smooth peanut butter and one white kitchen trash can size plastic bag that was used to wrap the cooking oil.

Some Richmond County grocery stores reported shortages of things like the containers of sugar and by Saturday morning Lowe’s in Rockingham had sold out of lids for the five gallon buckets. More are expected Monday or Tuesday.

The church had 142 buckets collected as of Saturday morning, and Mark Blake, one of the volunteers expected the total would hit at least 200. A single bucket is enough to feed a family of four for about two weeks.

Some donors included items that weren’t on the list, and those will be donated to the local soup kitchen. The list included canned goods, dry mashed potatoes and crackers.

From Rockingham, the buckets will be trucked Saturday to a collection point in St. Pauls. From there they will make the trip to Miami and then be loaded on a boat for Haiti.