World Food Day Highlights from North America

15 December 2018, Washington, DC - With 2030 almost decade away, World Food Day gave a clarion call for action and collaboration to end world hunger. In line with this year’s theme, “Our actions are our future: A #ZeroHunger world by 2030 is possible,” the FAO Liaison Office for North America joined the global community in marking they by organizing the following activities:

U.S. House and Senate RBold (Ctrl+B)esolutions

In recognition of World Food Day, the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate introduced two resolutions recognizing the importance of World Food Day and FAO’s lead role in combating global hunger.

Capitol Hill Briefing

To refocus policy-makers’ attention on global food security and nutrition issues, FAO North America, in conjunction with the Congressional Hunger Caucus and the Congressional Food Waste Caucus, hosted a Capitol Hill briefing on this year’s World Food Day theme along with the triumphs and challenges along the way to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal 2.

Twitter Chat

A widely attended World Food Day twitter chat "on 15 October, received 6 million impressions, and provided insights on how to transform food systems to achieve Zero Hunger.

Poetry Contest

Amplifying the call for action, FAO North America collaborated with Poetry X Hunger for the first of its kind World Food Day poetry contest. Inspiring empathy and action in the fight against hunger and malnutrition, the contest recognized the poem “Hunger Pains” by Aaron R. Whitehead in first place; “Hunger #1” by Jesse Alexander in second place, and “Shutter” by Teri Ellen Cross Davis in third. Honorable mentions include “Ode to the Body in the Duman River” by Meg Eden, “Hunger Game” by Henry Crawford, and “The Voice of Hunger” by Diane Wilbon Parks.

The award took place at a special reception hosted by FAO North America on the eve of World Food Day. The reception featured remarks by Kate Urbank, DC Site Director of Food Rescue US, who highlighted the important role that individuals can take to be food rescuers. Urbank is also featured in the 2018 World Food Day “My Actions” page, which features individuals taking action for Zero Hunger. Other speakers included Alex Hart, DC based Program Manager for Rise Against Hunger, who shared their initiative to beat the World Guinness Record for orchestrating the largest meal packing event simultaneously around the world on 16 October.  Hilary Salmon, Director of Communications at the Capital Area Food Bank, also expressed appreciation on the importance of World Food Day in brining awareness to eliminating all forms of hunger around the world and within the local community.

Volunteering at the Capital Area Food Bank

Taking the message home, UN colleagues from the IOM, UNIC, UNRWA, UNDP and WFP joined FAO staff to volunteer at the Capital Area Food Bank to pack meals for distribution in the DC, MD and VA area the week before on 9 October.  

World Food Day Podcast

Vimlendra Sharan, FAO Director for North America, was featured on Islamic Relief USA’s “What a Relief Podcast” discussing World Food Day.

U.S. Students at the Committee on Food Security

Through a partnership between FAO North America and the George Washington University's Planet Forward Initiative, four students from universities across the US participated in the official World Food Day ceremony and the 45^th session of the Committee on Food Security as observers.

From the impact of hunger on health to youth involvement in agriculture; from the role of the European Union to indigenous communities to eradicate hunger, the students brought their unique perspectives to the hunger narrative. See thier articles below:

• “Rural communities aim for 'Zero Hunger' goal by 2030,” by Sierra Williamson from University of Minnesota
• “If it's not at the table, it won't be on the menu: Health,” by Harleen Marwah from George Washington University
• “UN-FAO, European Union partner to build resilience to food crises,” by Arianna Dunham from George Washington University
• “Planting the seeds of tomorrow: Getting youth into ag,” Terrius Harris, Planet Forward Senior Correspondent from the University of Mississippi.

World Food Prize

For the rest of the World Food Week (15-19 October), several FAO colleagues attended the World Food Prize in Des Moines, Iowa. FAO North America co-hosted a side event with the Alliance to End Hunger at which the 2018 laureates Dr. David Nabarro and Dr. Laurence Haddad shared the stage and discussed pathways to ensure food and nutrition security amidst conflicts and climate variability. Media Planet, USA Today’s supplement, featuring FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva was widely distributed at the conference.

Read reflections from Dr. Laurence Haddad “Protect the Future to Prevent Going Forward to the Past: Food System Responses to Conflict and Climate Shocks”

Other World Food Day activities in North America

Across the United States and Canada, different stakeholders joined the call for action, and organized a variety of activities and articles. Below are a few highlights:

• Rise Against Hunger set a World Guinness Record for packing the most meals across multiple sites around the world, including more than 10 locations, 832 people, which resulted in 4,992 meals packed in 5 minutes! (link)
• DC Food Recovery Week organized events across the region to spotlight, celebrate and advocate for all the ways we can reduce and divert food waste and feed more people in DC. (link)
• Manna Community Food Rescue Week (link)
• The Ohio University Chapter of the American Meteorological Society and Wealth and Poverty Certificate students together raised 14 boxes of food donations for Good Works Inc. (link)
• #SoylentforGood Success on World Food Day (link)
• Postmates Expands Its FoodFight! Program — Reducing Food Waste in LA (link)
• Table for Two World Food Campaign: Change the World with Onigiri (Link)
• World Food Day at the Osprey Café (link)
• Food Drives Go Digital For World Food Day (link)
• Move 4 MANA - Heritage Woods Secondary School in Port Moody, British Columbia, launched their 2nd Move 4 MANA challenge on the Active for Good App. (Learn more about the initiative)
• Oxfam prompted its Eat for Good campaign on shopping and eating sustainably.
• Breakfasts for Better Days (And a Better World) (link)
• Recipe for Success (link)
• A vision of zero hunger in Canada (link)
• On World Food Day, Take a Holistic Approach to Food Production (link)
• Heifer + World Food Day (link)

Would you like to feature your event?  Please register your World Food Day activity at the following website:  www.fao.org/world-food-day/events/en/

To collaborate with FAO North America for future World Food Day initiatives, please contact Gabriel Laizer, Partnerships Officer at Gabriel.Laizer [@]fao.org.