During 2009 the global hunger crisis escalated with the number of people suffering from hunger climbing over one billion. This great humanitarian crisis calls for action on the part of world leaders. In countries like Afghanistan, Yemen, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia and Sudan hunger threatens hopes for peace. This book includes press releases, interviews and perspective on The Roadmap to End Global Hunger legislation in Congress. This bill (H.R. 2817) was introduced during 2009 by U.S. Representatives Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.). The legislation is based on the recommendations made by groups such as Save the Children, Catholic Relief Services, Mercy Corps, Friends of the World Food Program, World Vision and others. Inside you will hear from offiicials from these organizations as they discuss the Roadmap and its importance in fighting hunger. Also you will see how you can get involved to support the Roadmap to End Global Hunger. Also included in the book is a special historical perspective section on Fighting Hunger and World War II.
The Roadmap to End Global Hunger is available from:
The book Ending World Hunger: School Lunches for Kids Around the World features over 50 interviews with officials from the United Nations World Food Programme, Catholic Relief Services, World Vision, the Barefoot Foundation and ChildsLife International. Each interview shows the status of these critical child feeding programs and the potential for expanding them to achieve universal school feeding. The interviews also focus on the impact school meals have for children in developing countries as well as how people can help these programs. Some of the countries profiled are Afghanistan, Sudan, Colombia, Somalia and Pakistan. The interviews published in the book originally appeared online at Blogcritics magazine. The interviews were arranged by William Lambers in conjunction with the UN World Food Programme office in Washington DC.
10-month old Sara has been found to be malnourished, and will receive treatment to make her strong and healthy again. Even before the conflict, already one in three children under 5 years old in Côte d'Ivoire was suffering from chronic malnutrition (Photo: Annie Bodmer-Roy/Save the Children)
Earlier this year I wrote several stories about the conflict in the Ivory Coast. A disputed presidential election led to violence which displaced hundreds of thousands of people in the West African nation. While the post election violence has subsided, the scars remain. Hunger is still on the attack.
Annie Bodmer-Roy of Save the Children says, “The international perception is that because levels of violence have died down and the country has a president, the crisis is now resolved. This is not the case. Our teams are on the ground, speaking to children and their families and witnessing the horrible conditions that these people are still living in – we know that the humanitarian crisis is far from over.”
As we honor World Humanitarian Day , this is an important concept to note, not just for the Ivory Coast but for any conflict-affected area. Hunger and sickness are the companions of warfare. These scourges last much longer than the actual fighting itself. The Ivory Coast is one of these examples.
Think of your own community and how daily life plays itself out. And then imagine the unthinkable, a war striking. Basic things that you see every day, like food deliveries and shopping at stores, would cease. Housing would be destroyed, leaving many trying to find basic shelter. Imagine large-scale displacement, on foot mostly, as fuel deliveries have stopped. Farms that produce food may be damaged. Health clinics may be destroyed or unable to get deliveries because transportation systems are not functioning. Medical care would decline.
Once a war ends, these repairs to basic life must begin. It’s bad enough for any community to go through such a rebuilding process, but imagine areas that were already impoverished. Their resiliency would be far less. The same reconstruction pains often take place with recovery from natural disasters. In East Africa, for instance, recovery from the massive drought there will take years.
The key is maintaining focus on areas once the headline-grabbing conflict ends. For example, in Yemen very little coverage is given to the hundreds of thousands of displaced persons from the Sa’ada War in the northern part of the country. The fighting there too has subsided, but great suffering remains. In Southern Sudan, many are still struggling to recover from conflict with the North. Fighting earlier this year displaced hundreds of thousands of people. But you hear little of their plight in the headlines.
World Humanitarian Day is to honor the dedication of those helping in the many crisis points around the globe. It’s also a time to remember that humanitarian aid is still needed even long after the guns fall silent in a war zone. Just because news coverage wanes in an area does not mean the suffering does as well. It’s important to support humanitarian efforts in conflict or disaster zones to finish the job of reconstruction.
Coming soon, an interview with Annie Bodmer-Roy as she gives the latest on the situation in the Ivory Coast. She will discuss how Save the Children is helping communities fight hunger and overcome the effects of conflict. You can donate to Save the Children’s relief mission in the Ivory Coast here.
(Listen to Annie Bodmer-Roy of Save the Children discuss the post-conflict humanitarian crisis in the Ivory Coast in an interview in May with the BBC. )
Sara receives a supply of plumpy'nut: Genevieve, 34, heads home from the local health clinic with her son Komène and her daughter Sara, 10 months, asleep wrapped up against her mother’s back in the town of Guezon, western Ivory Coast. Genevieve has just received a bag full of plumpy’nut, a peanut paste packed with vitamins and minerals, designed to help babies like Sara recover from malnutrition. (photo: Annie Bodmer-Roy/Save the Children)
Plumpy'nut is a special peanut paste used to treat severe child malnutrition in small children. Countries suffering from conflict, natural disasters, or poverty need adequate supplies of plumpy'nut to combat child malnutrition. The plumpy'nut requires no cooking and can be easily stored and distributed. Children who suffer malnutrition in the first 1,000 days will have lasting physical and mental damage. (Photo: Annie Bodmer-Roy/Save the Children)
Tropical storm Emily just passed through Haiti, fortunately never developing into a hurricane. But it should serve as a reminder that Haiti is still very vulnerable to the shock of these storms. It’s important to build up Haiti’s resiliency so it can better withstand the risk of flooding that comes with these heavy rains.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP), as it seeks to help Haiti boost its food production, sponsors projects aimed at preventing damage to agriculture from flooding.
In addition, other WFP Food/Cash for Work projects are aimed at rubble removal, still very much a task even more than a year after the earthquake. There is still a long way to go in Haiti’s reconstruction. That is why the World Food Programme is urging support for its programs in Haiti. Malnutrition and poverty are still massive challenges for Haitians to overcome
WFP’s Stephanie Tremblay reports that the agency is facing a funding shortage for its programs. Without this funding, programs to protect the poor and boost agriculture and other projects will be at risk. WFP’s biggest project, school feeding, will be in jeopardy without funding.
Tremblay says, “We need an additional $14 million to purchase food – that will cover the needs of our school meals and nutrition programs – It also includes a take-home ration that we give students at the beginning of the school year to help families cope with back-to-school costs.”
WFP currently is reaching 1.1 million students with school meals as it helps the government build a national program. There is a long way to go to provide school meals for all children in Haiti.
Currently, there are many children in Haiti not yet enrolled in school. A national school lunch program needs to be developed to reach all these children. The food is what encourages parents to send their children to school.
Principal Sister Bernadette says Haitian children would “simply be too weak to study if they weren’t able to eat something at school. It’s important for them to have a meal here, most of them come from very poor families.” Marie Anika, 8, speaks for all children worldwide when she says, “It would be terrible if we didn’t get a meal at school. I really wouldn’t like that.”
WFP also needs $27 million to keep its cash/food for work projects, which are critical to the reconstruction, moving in the right direction.
The media spotlight may have moved on from Haiti, but the tremendous need is still very much present.
Mindy Mizell of World Vision is traveling through the Horn of Africa to report on the relief efforts for famine and drought victims. Amid so much chaos and horror Mizell finds rays of hope, such as 13-year-old Abdillahi, a Somali refugee living in Dadaab, Kenya. His family was forced to flee Somalia to find food and escape the violence.
Here is a child confronted with war and famine and Mizell said he never uttered a single complaint or talked about how unfortunate he was. Instead, he remained positive and upbeat.
Mizell writes, “I guess I expected him to say that he wanted more food, more water, better clothes or maybe a soccer ball. Instead, Abdillahi told me he wanted to go to school again! Not only did Abdillahi believe he had a bright future, but he spent several minutes advocating on behalf of his Somali friends and telling me that they all needed to go to school in order to find good jobs someday.”
World Vision’s Mindy Mizell interviews Abdillahi, 13, in the Dadaab refugee camp. (World Vision photo)
Young Abdillahi just pointed the way to what can end hunger and build peace in the Horn of Africa: education and food.
In responding to the drought in East Africa, it’s vital to ensure that all children can receive school meals and an education. This is extremely challenging, especially in areas where there are refugees and host communities all with great needs.
Lisa Doherty of UNICEF explains, “In some cases there have been massive influxes of communities and school-aged children into urban areas where there aren’t school facilities to absorb them all.”
UNICEF states that “school feeding, provision of learning materials and teacher incentives and additional learning spaces are the top priorities in order to ensure that children can access learning opportunities, many for the first time.”
Rozanne Chorlton, UNICEF Somalia Representative says, “Education is a critical component of any emergency response. Schools can provide a place for children to come to learn, as well as access health care and other vital services. Providing learning opportunities in safe environments is critical to a child’s survival and development and for the longer term stability and growth of the country.”
This is similar to what the U.S. Army did after World War II. For example, in Vienna, Austria, the U.S. military government helped reopen schools and start a feeding program. They did not want children roaming the streets, and giving them food at school was a top priority with post-war malnutrition rates climbing. The Army and food ambassador Herbert Hoover recognized the such programs were critical and needed to be strengthened and expanded. School feeding provided by the Allies and others after the war was a key defense, as famine threatened to attack many nations at that time.
Today, school meals play an urgent role in providing for refugee children in East Africa. Sandra Bulling of CARE says, “we are currently planning to set up lunch programs for the accelerated learning program of newly arrived refugee children, many of whom have never been to school before.”
Aid agencies are mobilizing to help children through this crisis and open the door to a better life in the future. But will there be enough funding? Fighting hunger and building children’s education is an area of neglect in the foreign policy of many governments. How do you change this? It’s up to the public to tell their representatives in government that it should be a top priority for all children to receive school meals and an education.
That is what can make a difference in the long term for children in East Africa and elsewhere who just want to go to school again.
See videos from the World Food Programme’s WeFeedback page.
Elizabeth Stoltz of Plumpy’nut Press just interviewed Irene Moora, a Nutrition Specialist from CESVI, an Italian humanitarian organization, who just returned from Galkayo, Somalia. Learn about the use of the miracle food in the famine relief mission in Somalia.
Tropical storm Emily just passed through Haiti, fortunately never developing into a hurricane. But it should serve as a reminder that Haiti is still very vulnerable to the shock of these storms. It’s important to build up Haiti’s resiliency so it can better withstand the risk of flooding that comes with these heavy rains.
Author William Lambers 