L.J. Traband, manager and raiser of money

Lester J. Traband, 70, a financial planner, an insurance broker and a civic activist, died of cancer Saturday at home in Woodbury.

Since 1970, Mr. Traband had operated Traband Associates, an insurance firm in Woodbury. He was also a financial planner, and in 2000 he published Obtaining Your Financial Black Belt: Power and Control Over Money.

He used his expertise to raise money for causes he believed in, his wife, Lee, said. In 1977, the couple helped found the Hunger Project.

"The group does not feed people. Other organizations are already working on that," Mr. Traband told a reporter in 1990. "The Hunger Project is a strategic organization. We look beyond the existing structures and systems to determine what keeps hunger in place when food is available."

Mr. Traband raised more than $20 million for Hunger Project programs in Africa, India and Bangladesh, including aid for villagers to establish small businesses and market their goods, his wife said. He also raised several hundred thousand dollars, she said, for the Pachamama Alliance, which is dedicated to preserving tropical rain forests.

He was a past president of the Foundation for Community Leadership, and in 2006 he established the Sufficiency Foundation to fund global initiatives.

A wine and food connoisseur, Mr. Traband wrote a wine column for the Woodbury Daily Times in the 1970s, and was a member of the Philadelphia chapter of the Confrérie de la Chaîne des Rôtisseurs, a gastronomic society. He served on the board of Mullica Hill Friends School and on the vestry of the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd in Pitman.

Mr. Traband graduated from Pitman High School and served in the Air Force in West Germany.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by a son, Rhett; a daughter, Lili; stepchildren Paul, Bruce and Ivan Weinstein and Lila Jones; a brother; 10 grandchildren; and his former wife, Eleonore. A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. Sunday at the Kelley Funeral Home, 125 Pitman Ave., Pitman. Another service will be scheduled in the spring.

Memorial donations may be made to the Hunger Project, 5 Union Square W., New York, N.Y. 10003.