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World Food Day Action Countdown: hunger bytes! video contest

Emily.Stivers — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:13:08 +0000

The World Food Programme has been calling on you to take action counting down to today, World Food Day. From October 1, we have issued a daily challenge as part of our Billion for a Billion campaign.

While many celebrate World Food Day, the reality is that over a billion people in the world don’t have access to food.

Today’s action is the biggest yet: submit a 1-minute or shorter video to our hunger bytes! contest for 2,500 points.

Don’t have the means to make a video? Update your social networks to let them know you completed the World food Day countdown, and you can still get points for completing the 16 actions.

“Let’s remember that more than one billion people won’t get enough nutritious food to eat today. We can change this — so our challenge is to turn ‘No Food Day’ back into ‘World Food Day’ for the hundreds of millions without food on their table tonight,” said Josette Sheeran, head of the World Food Programme, today in Rome.

In order to draw attention to the plight of the hungry, we’ve organized the hunger bytes! video contest. We want you to submit a 30-60 second video on hunger — something thought-provoking which encourages people to act.

Last year’s winners, students from Auburn University in Alabama, won a trip to Ethiopia to check out our operations. This year, you could win a trip to the field. Plus, just for submitting, you will get 2,500 Campus Challenge points for a partner activity. Report your actions here.

For more information, check out the hunger bytes! page.

World Food Day Countdown: The climate-hunger connect

Chris.Scott — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 20:42:46 +0000

One more day until World Food Day! The World Food Programme is calling on you to take action in the days counting down to World Food Day, October 16. Each day we issue a daily challenge as part of our Billion for a Billion campaign.

Today’s Action: Write a story, op-ed, or letter to the editor for your school newspaper or local newspaper on how climate change is impacting the hungry in Africa. Send a copy to us so you can get points. Not a writer? Pass on the video below where Thievery Corporation sees the impacts of climate change in Nepal.

To get started, check out ONE’s issue page on climate and development, here.

Way up on the ‘Roof of the World,’ the great Himalayas that thrust across the middle of Asia rule a domain that many scientists view as the “Ground Zero” of climate change.

The Himalayan glaciers comprise the largest store of fresh water outside the poles of the earth, feeding seven major Asian rivers. This gigantic watershed is source of life — and livelihoods — for more than 1 billion people in Nepal, India and China; they rely on it for agriculture, drinking water, sanitation, even hydroelectric power.

Alarmingly, as temperatures rise, these glaciers are melting and thinning rapidly — at rates scientists say have doubled
since 2004 alone. This phenomenon carries profound implications for food security, especially when combined with unpredictable monsoons, a rise in extreme weather, and years of unusually dry winters that have depleted snowpack and soil moisture essential for farming.

Gatlang, a picturesque Himalayan village of stone houses, exemplifies a dangerously shifting landscape in Nepal that has suffered a “sharp and sustained decline in food security.” Forty percent of the population is already under-nourished.

A mountain stream that flows through town powers a flour grinding mill – and prayer wheels that spin out blessings. Yet nature’s blessings have not been bountiful in recent years.

Chersingh Tamang, a 60-year-old farmer we met during a recent visit, has seen dramatic declines in rain and snowfall in his lifetime. Gesturing toward majestic Mt. Langtang in the distance and the tightly terraced slopes of his village, he says: “We used to see all snow on that mountain – now we see much bare rock … we used to produce abundant harvests of barley, potatoes and wheat. No longer.”

The World Food Programme works with Nepalese farmers like Chersingh to try new crops like red rice, medicinal plants, and gourmet mushrooms, while improved seeds are growing better yields from traditional crops. Our food-for-work programs build and rehabilitate miles of dikes, dams, irrigation systems – plant trees – and reclaim land.

It is a race against time — and the elements.

World Food Day Action Countdown: Blog against hunger

Chris.Scott — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:15:21 +0000

The World Food Programme is calling on you to take action in the days counting down to World Food Day, October 16. Each day we issue a daily challenge as part of our Billion for a Billion campaign.

With only two days to go until the big day, today’s challenge is about using the knowledge you’ve collected.

Action: Submit an OCC Blog entry about hunger If you have your own blog, you can write about hunger issues there. Otherwise, submit a blog entry on the problem of hunger, what your school is doing about it this month, or what you think the United States or world leaders should do about it. Include a picture of yourself, your OCC Team, or something hunger-related, and make your entry about 200 words or so.

Where to begin?

These are three of the biggest issues on the table:

There are more hungry people in the world today than ever before: this year, the number of chronically hungry in the world reached 1.02 billion.
With the financial crisis and high food prices, feeding the hungry is tougher than ever: more mouths to feed means the knock-on effect of economic woes and high food prices is a recipe for disaster. Climate change is proving a crisis multiplier bringing cycles of extreme weather closer together.
The economic downturn affects us in two ways. First, fundraising has become harder. Second, while the apex of the crisis hit developed nations last year, it swiftly moved on to hammer poorer nations, slashing trade investment and remittances. Third, in developing countries, food costs up to 70% more than it did the year before — at the peak of the food crisis.

In short, when more money is desperately needed, less money is available.
Good nutrition is vital to our planet’s future health and prosperity: a full stomach keeps kids in school and helps them focus, an important investment for any country. Adequate nutrition is essential to mental and physical development, especially from womb to age 2. Without it, children can suffer irreversible damage. Iron deficiency is the world’s most common form of malnutrition. A diet lacking iron impedes cognitive development, extreme fatigue and heart complications.
66 million children attend school hungry in developing countries. But it only takes 25 cents a day to fill the cup and provide a nutritious meal.

The World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. We offer assistance in 74 countries, using food to help shattered communities rebuild their lives and futures.

The World Food Day Action Countdown forms part of our call to the billion people who are active online, to help the one billion people who are hungry: A Billion for a Billion!

For more ways you can make a difference go to

World Food Day Action Countdown: What is the impact of assisting farmers?

Emily.Stivers — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:28:39 +0000

Earn 500 OCC points every day you participate in the World Food Programme’s “Action a Day” series. If you complete all 16 actions, you can get an additional 2,500 points. Submit your actions for points here.

-Emily

Today’s action is: Take the Hunger quiz! Then read on below to see how we are working with partners to prevent hunger.

9th-grader Getachew Abeye plows the earth with his oxen.

The World Food Programme works with the world’s most marginalized people. Typically, they’re families living on less than $2 a day, who can’t fall back on social “safety nets” – food stamps, subsidized school lunches – like we have in the US. It takes little to push them over the edge – especially when disaster strikes.

Most of our work is emergency-related, but we’re also all about building resilience to future shocks.

In Ethiopia, severe food crisis occur frequently despite huge gains in agricultural production; nearly one in two kids grow up stunted by malnutrition. One of the chief culprits is weather: 90 percent of Ethiopia’s agriculture is rainfed and, like much of Africa, changing rainfall patterns threaten to cut agricultural yields by as much as half in 2020.

Because every drop of rain counts, we work with Ethiopia’s MERET program, supporting communities to rehabilitate their degraded land and watersheds – and manage them better for the future. Through MERET, we’ve helped more than a million food-insecure Ethiopians reclaim 300,000 hectares of land.

A farmer stands with his irrigated crops that have benefited from the MERET program in Ethiopia.

The Lasta region of northern Ethiopia – one of the country’s poorest – stands testament to the ravages of environmental degradation. Its spectacular mountains are bare of trees and vegetation, while deep gulleys tell how precious volcanic topsoil long ago washed away. Goats and scrawny cattle munch on what’s left, while farmers hack away at the pitiless rocky earth.

By contrast, MERET’s Derowa watershed program seems an oasis – with sparkling green hillsides protected from livestock, neat rows of microdams and water catchment, and new vegetable varieties sprouting among traditional staple crops.

Farmer Alemaye Channi, the program’s chief planner, proudly recounts how his community has transformed their 400 hectares. He beams as 9th-grader Getachew Abeye plows the earth with his oxen. The teen-ager explains how a second growing season now allows them to plant non-traditional crops like onions, papaya, hot peppers and coffee; he says it’s doubled household income.

As the sky grudgingly dusts the land with rain, and farmers look ahead to another harvest, he says: “It’s as if the land gave birth to another land.”

Take a Stand This Weekend

Emily.Stivers — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:15:39 +0000

Every year, OCC offers a prize to the school with the best “Stand Up and Take Action” event in October, and this year is no different. Plan your event for October 16-18, and then tell us about it for a chance to win a 4×6 foot ONE banner. You get 2,500 OCC points just for holding an event, and we’ll have some bonus points for the winning school, too.

-Emily

Stand Up and Take Action is fast approaching. On October 16th, 17th, and 18th, millions of people around the world will Stand Up and Take Action for the fourth year in a row to show their support for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the fight against poverty. This global event is coordinated by the UN Millennium Campaign and GCAP, and you better believe that ONE is going to be a part of it again this year.

From coast to coast, ONE members are Standing Up. Take Atlanta, Georgia for example. In collaboration with CARE, ONE members are hosting an exciting evening in Atlanta on Saturday, October 17. The event will be hosted by CNN’s Fredricka Whitfield and two of the world’s most prominent global health experts – Dr. Thomas Frieden, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; and Dr. Helene Gayle, CEO of CARE. This informative and entertaining night will feature live music, food, a microfinance marketplace, and more. Plus, attendees will have the opportunity to help those in developing countries by urging support from elected officials. Learn more and RSVP here.

ONE Stand Up and Take Action events are also happening in the following locations across the US. Click on a city near you to RSVP and be a part of it all!

For a complete list of Stand Up events happening throughout the country, go to the Stand Up website and click on events in your region. Want to organize your own event? Just register on the website and describe your event — large or small.

Stand Up is a once-a-year opportunity to join with millions of others speaking out against hunger and poverty. Are you ready to stand?

-Jen Fraser

World Food Day Action Countdown: Unleash the power of the Web

Emily.Stivers — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:50:39 +0000

-Emily

We live in a world that is more connected through technology than ever before. Social media has permeated the lives of millions and given a voice to the voiceless. Let’s give a voice to the billion hungry in the world, who too often remain hidden.

Action: Call on the Twestival to choose hunger as the theme for the 2010 global event. Either send a tweet to @twestival or drop them an email at info@twestival.com

What is the Twestival? The Twitter festival brings people together online and offline to advocate for an issue. In 2009, the Twestival worked to get people clean drinking water. In 2010, let’s see that people have access to food.

We’ve been focusing on small actions you can take to make a difference. This small act- reaching out to the event organizers – could lead to a larger group effort to raise awareness about hunger and poverty and bring change to those who need it most.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has pointed to social media as the tools for engaging a “truly global society”.

The ripple effect of the internet is the same as the principle, “let each one, teach one;” each person can effect change by reaching out to educating someone they know.

Whether it’s 140 characters on Twitter, emails to elected officials, information displayed on a widget on your blog or Facebook profile or more trustworthy measures of data, these tools enable us to reach out to one another like never before.

As Brown says, “Take…what modern technology is capable of: the power of our moral sense allied with the power of communications and our ability to organize internationally. That… gives us the first opportunity as a community to fundamentally change the world.”

Let’s view all of our actions this week as part of a larger push to move towards a more just world.

Let’s raise our voices about hunger.

World Food Day Action Countdown: Talk about empowered small scale farmers!

Emily.Stivers — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:00:47 +0000

-Emily

Today’s Action: leave a comment to this post telling us your thoughts/ideas/feelings about how to empower small-scale farmers. Don’t forget to report your action for OCC points.

How can purchasing locally improve people’s lives?

In the US, increasingly people buy food locally to support their farming community. In the developing world, buying from local farmers can provide a lifeline and source of hope to farmers living in grinding poverty.
In Africa 8 out of 10 farmers in Africa are female, and so buying locally often acts as a form female empowerment too.

Anne Rono lives in southwest Kenya. This year, her seven children helped her harvest their produce. The youngest is three years old, and helps by picking up maize dropped on the ground by the older siblings.

Normally, her one-acre farm produces about 14 bags of maize. But this year’s crop filled just four bags. Even so, Anne needs to sell some of her grain to pay for school fees and essentials that she can’t grow on the farm.

Normally, Anne is at the mercy of Kenyan traders, who take advantage of small scale farmers by offering them below-market price for their maize.
But this year, under a World Food Program initiative called Purchase for Progress or P4P, Anne has another option.

By giving small scale farmers access to fairer prices and a reliable buyer, the program puts more cash into the hands of small scale farmers and improves lives.

Anne is excited that her seven children will benefit from the program.
“P4P can change my life, because by selling maize, I will get money, so my kids can get a better education, they can change their lives, they can wear good shoes, clothes,” she says. “And then, even me, I can get money so I can get fertilizer for the farm. So I know that P4P can help us.”

Although Anne’s farm is small, buying better seeds and more fertilizer will enable her to produce more. With programs like P4P, Ann and other small farmers throughout the developing world can make real improvements in their lives.

World Food Day Action Countdown: Highlight empowered small farmers!

Emily.Stivers — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 14:00:17 +0000

-Emily

The World Food Programme is calling on you to take action in the days counting down to World Food Day, October 16. Each day we will issue a daily challenge as part of our Billion for a Billion campaign.

Action: Share the video below of Purchase for Progress with your friends.

You can share the video here.

Recently in New York, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton discussed the Obama Administration’s commitment to combat hunger worldwide, stressing a comprehensive approach to food security to ensure critical emergency needs are met while addressing the “underlying causes of hunger”. Reaching out to women farmers is a critical part of their plan.

The World Food Programme has been working to empower women and small farmers through an innovative program called Purchase for Progress or P4P: we buy food from local farmers to feed the hungry in the same country.

Linda Jacinto, a farmer from Mozambique, sold beans to the program this year through a cooperative that works with farmers’ associations in Nampula and P4P. Linda says the program is a real incentive to increase her production of beans so she can sell more. She used the money to buy corrugated iron to rebuild the roof of her home. Next on her shopping list is concrete to strengthen the walls, and then a motorbike for transport.

Most Mozambicans are semi-subsistence farmers who live below the poverty line. They face a host of obstacles from poor storage to a lack of access to markets and market information. Purchase for Progress empowers farmers by giving them access to markets and a guaranteed buyer for their surplus food — a major incentive for farmers to invest in their farms.

This increases both the quantity and quality of their harvests, and ensures food will be available for the lean times of the year. Community ownership is crucial to the program’s success, and working together at the grassroots allows communities to increase their production and productivity. It also improves food security, while providing locally grown maize and beans for food assistance programs in Mozambique.

World Food Day Action Countdown: Hunger Awareness Dinner

Emily.Stivers — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 20:43:58 +0000

-Emily

We’re more than halfway through the countdown challenge! Celebrate by trying out a new recipe and sharing what you’ve made with your friends. Use the opportunity to talk about the challenge and why you’re participating.

Action: Raise awareness about hunger by cooking something for your friends. You can use these recipes, created by famous chefs, as inspiration. Take a picture of what you make and email it to us. You’ll also want to report your action for OCC points.

Four restaurants with world-class chefs have joined forces with us to raise awareness about the importance of school meals. Each chef has created a special regional dish on their menus throughout October, highlighting an area of the world where we provide food. They’re donating 25 percent of sales from these dishes to provide meals for school children in developing countries.

Can’t visit these restaurants? The chefs are giving you a chance to serve up your own version of their special recipes at home. By sharing their talent and creativity, they’re spreading the word on their menus to diners like you. You can use their recipes, or make one of your own, to spread the word about the importance of school meals too!

Why are meals at school important? They provide hope to millions of school children all over the world. No one can learn on an empty stomach.

Food is also a major incentive for families to send their children — especially girls — to school in places where families struggle get their next meal. Some 66 million children attend school hungry in the developing world. But it only takes 25 cents a day to fill the cup and provide a nutritious meal.

For inspiration, check out these recipes from world-class chefs here, and get cooking!

World Food Day Action Countdown: Design a t-shirt

Emily.Stivers — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 19:38:56 +0000

Earn 500 OCC points for every day you participate in the World Food Programme’s “Action a Day” series. If you complete all 16 actions, you can earn an additional 2,500 points for a Partner Activity. Just hold on to your links that prove you’ve taken part in these actions, and once we launch OCC officially next week, submit them as a “Make Your Own Action.” Good luck!

-Emily

Today’s action is to create and submit a design to the Shirt.Woot Derby. Each week, designers submit t-shirt ideas to Shirt.Woot as part of a design contest (or “derby”). The winning shirt is based on number of votes from the public.

This week, we’ve taken over the competition and all the entries will focus on raising awareness about hunger.

Action: Get creative! Submit a drawing or design to the competition.

Shirt.Woot will print the top three winning designs, with the first place design going up for sale on World Food Day, October 16. This means you get to spread the word about hunger online by simply designing a t-shirt, and then possibly offline post-competition when people buy the t-shirt!

Need some inspiration? Check out this page of facts on hunger. And think about finding a cool way to incorporate the red cup into your design. We use these red plastic cups all over the world to deliver school meals, and they’ve become an iconic symbol of both need and hope for hungry children. Also check out these designs!

Design by Thievery Corporation:

By Dede Sahroni, 13, in fifth grade in the SDN Bantar Jaya 03 school in Desa Bantar Jaya, Indonesia. In his picture, the children who are eating WFP biscuits are active, energetic and happy to study. But the children who do not eat WFP biscuits are sleepy and lazy, and they are not able to learn about science and technology.

Cesar Luis Martínez Guzmán is twelve. He thinks WFP is like the sea, reaching all continents. His painting shows a well-fed, united world.

The World Food Programme is the humanitarian agency on the frontline fighting hunger worldwide. We offer assistance in 74 countries, using food to help shattered communities rebuild their lives and futures.

The World Food Day Action Countdown forms part of our call to the billion people who are active online, to help the one billion people who are hungry: A Billion for a Billion!

For more ways you can make a difference go to http://wfp.org/1billion