Voices from the White House Conference on Hunger and Nutrition
Publication year
Resource type
UNCCD Library
Material Type
news article
The first conference of its kind in half a century brought together hundreds of anti-hunger advocates, nutritionists, researchers, farmers, and policymakers to hammer out a set of shared goals. Here’s what people were saying on the ground. “I experienced firsthand the impacts of poverty, hunger, and homelessness on my mind, my body, and my soul,” Jimmieka Mills, the co-founder of Equitable Spaces, told a crowd in Washington, D.C. yesterday. “I know what it’s like to not know where your next meal will come from, both as a child and as a parent.”
Mills was on stage half a mile from the White House to introduce President Biden to a room of hundreds of anti-hunger advocates, nutritionists, researchers, farmers, policymakers, and a large global online audience. After a somewhat rocky lead-up to the Conference on Hunger, Health, and Nutrition—the first of its kind since 1969—Biden and many others in the room emphasized the moment as historic. The day before, his administration released a 44-page, five-pillar National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health that set a target to end hunger and increase healthy eating by 2030.
“Our bold goals require a whole-of-government approach and a whole-of-society effort,” Biden told the crowd. “No child should go to bed hungry, no parent should die of a disease that could be prevented. When we’re at our best, we think big.”Big thinking will be necessary given the current landscape: Although food insecurity rates were slightly down in 2021 due to COVID-related expansions of the safety net, many of those additional supports have gone away, while food prices are still soaring. And more recent surveys show food insecurity shot up again this summer, with many people returning to food banks. At the same time, poor nutrition is connected to several of the leading contributing factors in COVID-19 deaths.
Experts praised many of the components of the National Strategy, especially making the expansion of the Child Tax Credit permanent and expanding the number of students who qualify for free school meals—with a pathway toward free meals for all by 2032. READ further from the source
Mills was on stage half a mile from the White House to introduce President Biden to a room of hundreds of anti-hunger advocates, nutritionists, researchers, farmers, policymakers, and a large global online audience. After a somewhat rocky lead-up to the Conference on Hunger, Health, and Nutrition—the first of its kind since 1969—Biden and many others in the room emphasized the moment as historic. The day before, his administration released a 44-page, five-pillar National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health that set a target to end hunger and increase healthy eating by 2030.
“Our bold goals require a whole-of-government approach and a whole-of-society effort,” Biden told the crowd. “No child should go to bed hungry, no parent should die of a disease that could be prevented. When we’re at our best, we think big.”Big thinking will be necessary given the current landscape: Although food insecurity rates were slightly down in 2021 due to COVID-related expansions of the safety net, many of those additional supports have gone away, while food prices are still soaring. And more recent surveys show food insecurity shot up again this summer, with many people returning to food banks. At the same time, poor nutrition is connected to several of the leading contributing factors in COVID-19 deaths.
Experts praised many of the components of the National Strategy, especially making the expansion of the Child Tax Credit permanent and expanding the number of students who qualify for free school meals—with a pathway toward free meals for all by 2032. READ further from the source
Keywords
food production
nutrition security
hunger and poverty
health and diet
food security
food policy
children
USA