No feral hog meat for Missouri’s poor

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) – Missouri will not move ahead with a plan to process feral hog meat to help feed poor people after conservation officials said the invasive animals don’t meet food safety standards.

The Missouri Department of Conservation sends the nonprofit Conservation Federation of Missouri a state grant annually for its Share the Harvest program, which allows deer hunters to donate venison to poor people.

But the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that this year, the conservation department left $300,000 budgeted for the program on the table after lawmakers required the money to be spent on processing feral hog meat in addition to deer meat.