Often when we think of hunger, we think of poor children in parts of African and Asia. In our mind these children have bloated bellies, and are often half-naked. We do not immediately think of what hunger looks like in the United States.
This is especially true in Minnesota, where we have one of the lowest poverty rates in the nation. Yet hunger is a part of many Minnesotans’ lives.
Bread for the World is one organization in Minnesota that is working to seek justice and end hunger. 36.3 million people in the United States are at risk of being hungry. Hunger affects 7.1 percent of all Minnesotans each year. Hunger, similar to homelessness, is affecting a large percentage of families and children. 40 percent of the homeless in Minnesota are children and youth, and 56 percent of people requesting emergency food assistance were either children or their parents.1 2
Many people who are hungry have experienced some of the same crises that can lead to homelessness. Older folks can find their savings wiped out by unavoidable medical bills; a single mother making minimum wage may have to choose between buying food or paying rent; many children may struggle to do well in school because their parents couldn’t afford to feed them the night before.
Bread for the World uses a two leg approach to ending hunger. They want to address both the immediate concerns, and the underlying causes. Just as with homelessness, the emergency programs such as food banks or emergency shelters alone cannot end the problem. While they are helpful in serving the immediate need, they cannot stop people from becoming hungry or homeless.
Hunger is becoming a growing problem among the working poor. 40 percent of those seeking food assistance have one family member with a full-time job. But these jobs do not provide enough income to buy food, pay rent and medical bills, buy clothes for their children and afford a car so that they can travel to work.
Tammy Walhof, Midwest regional director for Bread for the World, says that, “People living on food stamps are some of the best money managers I’ve met. [It’s] because they have been living on so little.”
When someone can work 40 hours a week and not make enough to thrive, it shows us that there are systematic factors that keep people poor and hungry. If hard work was the answer, then all of the people who are working hard would not be hungry.
Instead, it shows us that hunger is a political condition. The key to overcoming hunger is to change the politics of hunger.
One of the ways Bread for the World is fighting to change the politics of hunger is by advocating for the Federal Hunger-Free Communities Act of 2005, bill numbers S. 1120, and H.R. 2717. This act commits the United States to:
- Cut U.S. food insecurity and hunger in half by 2010;
- End U.S. hunger by 2015;
- Require accountability from the U.S.D.A on making progress toward these goals;
- Protect the structure and funding for national nutrition programs, such as food stamps;
- Authorizes a $50 million grant program to fund grassroots groups;
- Authorizes the collection of county hunger data.
This bill is an all-in-one package. Its goals are to end hunger, to protect the current national programs, and to fund local innovate programs. Since it was introduced, Senator Coleman has signed on as a co-sponsor.
Visit Bread for the World or the Hunger Action Network for more information on the act.