On the heels of Blog Action Day ~ Poverty yesterday comes World Food Day. These two go hand in hand. In browsing around the web, I've found tons of organizations that give so many simple ways for the average person to do that ONE small thing to help.
For instance, the Hunger Site you can simply CLICK to give food...how much more simpler can you get??!! You can also buy items through their store that are Fair Trade.
Bread for the World is a collective Christian voice urging our nation’s decision makers to end hunger at home and abroad. 862 million people worldwide, including 1 in 10 American families go to bed hungry or without enough to eat. With the stroke of a pen, policies are made that redirect millions of dollars and affect millions of lives.
Bread for the World members work to make our nation's laws more fair and compassionate to people in need by meeting with and writing personal letters and emails to our members of Congress.
Bread for the World is a bipartisan and ecumenical organization. We also collaborate with other organizations to build the political commitment needed to overcome hunger and poverty. For example, Bread is a founding partner of ONE: The Campaign to Make Poverty History.
The long long LIST of ONE.ORG Partners...check them out!!!!
Compassion is a organization that is near and dear to our hearts especially! I've talked about the sweet little boy, Syrus that we sponsor through Compassion on a monthly basis. You can also donate through them a one time gift...towards a child or to go towards their Global Food Crisis fund. This is also something our family has done.
World Vision is another reputable and fantastic organization! You can also sponsor a child monthly through World Vision or give a one time donation. The opportunities to give are simply endless!
Hunger Facts from the Stop Hunger Now site ~
In the least developed countries of the world, 142 children out of 1,000 die before their fifth birthday. By comparison, in the United States 8 children in 1,000 will die before turning five years old.
Source: The World Bank, Data and Statistics, MDGs.
More than 854 million people in the world are malnourished.
Source: Undernourishment Around the World 2006. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
The world produces enough food to feed everyone. Total food production in calories per person per day has increased by 25 percent since 1961 and is more than sufficient to feed every person on earth 2800 calories per day. The principal problem is that many people in the world do not have sufficient land to grow, or income to purchase, enough food.
Source: FAOSTAT Agriculture Data: Food Supply, Crops, Primary Equivalent. February, 2004.
There are about 1 billion people in the world living at the margin of survival on less than $1 a day. 2.6 billion people live on less than $2 per day - which is 40% of the world’s population. Over 800 million of these poor suffer from chronic hunger, which means that their daily intake of calories is insufficient for them to lead active and healthy lives.
Source: UNDP Human Development Report 2007/2008.
Protein-energy malnutrition (PEM) affects every fourth child worldwide: 150 million (26.7%) are underweight while 182 million (32.5%) are stunted. Geographically, more than 70 percent of PEM children live in Asia, 26 percent in Africa and 4 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean. Their plight may well have begun even before birth with a malnourished mother.
Source: World Health Organization 2002.
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As we can all see...it is never a matter of not knowing how to help, it is only a matter of choosing from a vast variety of wonderful organizations and joining in to be a part...even a small part of something bigger than ourselves!
Let's think about this today...what can we do? How can we teach our children to think outside the box? To be thankful for all the many things we do have that so so many other people do not have. Let's think about the next time we or our children say "I'm starving"...when we probably have no idea what that feeling truly is.
1 comment:
Wow... isn't this humbling and motivating? Most of the world does not live like we do in the states... grab a burger, make a salad... we are so blessed. Where we live, $8 will feed a family for a week. Whenever we (the missionary families) get some extra support, we buy huge bags of rice and drive from shanti to shanti in the villages and give them sacks of rice. Such a simple and cheap thing, and yet it gives them the love of Christ in a bowl of white rice.
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