Every year on October 16, World Food Day, founded in 1979 by the United Nations, aims to raise awareness of hunger and malnutrition, and create an opportunity to promote healthy diets for all. Opportunities to combat hunger and improve nutrition cannot be for a short-term fix. Sustainable solutions are needed.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, people living in America learned very quickly that our own food supply chain is far from sustainable and is in fact quite frail, and that our safety net is tattered. Thankfully, we had the resources to create additional supports, such as Emergency Allotments for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), expanded and inclusive child tax credits, and healthy free school meals for all students, for a true safety net.
This National School Lunch Week, the Food Research & Action Center (FRAC) is rallying support for a crucial initiative: a nationwide Healthy School Meals for All policy. This would ensure all students have access to the nutritious school meals they need to learn and thrive.
Soon, D-SNAP will help those impacted by Hurricane Helene — heralded as the worst hurricane of the modern era.5 With each passing year, people in America have experienced some of the costliest and most destructive storms on record.6 The climate crisis is increasing the frequency, intensity, and destruction of extreme weather events across the U.S.7
Hunger is compounded by disasters and emergencies that affect food distribution, including extreme weather events, and D-SNAP fills the gap by providing participants with emergency benefits for food.