This year, two measures to reduce food loss and waste were reintroduced in both chambers of Congress, calling for a whole-of-government approach to making U.S. food systems more efficient and effective. The Food Date Labeling Act was reintroduced in the House by Reps. Chellie Pingree (D-ME) and Dan Newhouse (R-WA) and in the Senate by Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Rick Scott (R-FL). The NO TIME TO Waste Act was reintroduced in the House by Reps. Chellie Pingree (D-ME) and Mike Lawler (R-NY) and in the Senate by Sens. Chris Coons (D-DE) and Jerry Moran (R-KS).

Reps. Chellie Pingree (D-ME) and Dan Newhouse (R-WA) also re-launched the Congressional Food Recovery Caucus with the aim of informing members of Congress about food loss and waste and urging them to support measures to reduce it.

Regenerative and Resilient Agriculture

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), also referred to as H.R. 1, cut several climate and clean energy investments by rescinding program funds obligated under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022. H.R. 1 also shifted IRA funding for key agriculture conservation programs into the latest Farm Bill baseline funding. These programs include the Agriculture Conservation Easement Program (ACEP), the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), and the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). The original IRA provisions that would have gone to American farmers and foresters for climate-smart agriculture efforts within these programs have been removed.

H.R.1 also made changes to livestock indemnity and insurance programs for farm losses due to climate impacts such as extreme heat and drought. An analysis from the American Farm Bureau Federation shared that drought, extreme heat, and wildfires accounted for $11 billion in crop losses in 2024.

On a positive note, H.R. 1 established the Poultry Insurance Pilot Program under the Federal Crop Insurance Act. This program would provide index-based insurance for poultry producers impacted by extreme weather.

Finally, on December 10th, USDA announced a new $700 million regenerative pilot program focused on soil health, water quality, and supporting farmers with producing safe, nutritious, and affordable food. The pilot will be administered under the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), with more details forthcoming in 2026.

Development Finance Corporation

The U.S. Development Finance Corporation (DFC) was established to utilize financial tools to promote private sector investment in low- and lower-middle-income countries. These tools include debt financing, equity investments, project development, and more. The DFC’s objectives are to support eligible countries’ economic development, U.S. economic interests, and U.S. foreign policy. Although efforts have been made since 2024 to reauthorize and improve the DFC, its authorization expired in October 2025.

The DFC’s goals indicate that it has the potential to lead to significant progress against hunger and malnutrition. Its past work includes support for public-private partnerships that range from implementing solar-powered irrigation and refrigeration projects in India, to reducing the risk to lenders for investing in smallholder farms in Malawi, to creating jobs in Namibia’s agrifood sector. However, provisions in the most recent congressional reauthorization proposal would place more focus on working with high-income countries at the expense of its original purpose—promoting mutually beneficial private-public partnerships with lower-income countries.

The Paris Climate Agreement

In January 2026, the Trump Administration will have met the requirements under the rules of the Paris Agreement to withdraw the United States from participation. When the Paris Agreement was adopted by 195 countries in December 2015, it was hailed as a historic step toward managing climate change, and all signatories committed to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions to limit the increase in Earth’s temperature to 2 degrees Celsius. By withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, the U.S. is taking a major step back from pursuing actions that can help end hunger, along with resigning from the global leadership opportunity to innovate in energy, agriculture, and development sectors.

After withdrawing from the Paris Agreement in January 2026, the U.S. will relinquish its financial commitments to support climate resilience building projects for communities most affected by climate change. This includes rural and farming communities that depend on healthy soil and reliable weather patterns to grow food, which are made worse by climate change. Leadership in this space is a dire need, especially when less than 3 percent of climate finance goes to food systems, and the U.S. could be a stronger partner in these efforts.

Despite these changes, states, cities, and local communities across the country are incubating new ideas and approaches to curbing the negative impacts of climate change and building climate resilience. Bread for the World will closely follow these emerging sub-national climate efforts, and will continue keeping our network informed in the year ahead.

Isabel Vander Molen is a Climate-Hunger Policy Advisor at Bread for the World’s Policy and Research Institute (PRI).

The post Legislative Moments that Shaped Agriculture, Climate, and Food Security in 2025 appeared first on Bread for the World.

Editor’s note: Institute Insights is pleased to include this article that describes the work of Annapurna Mission, an initiative that promotes agroecology in India. The author participated in Bread for the World’s inaugural Climate and Nutrition Symposium in April 2025.

As part of our ongoing advocacy to end hunger and malnutrition around the world, Bread for the World emphasizes that caring for the Earth and creating sustainable food systems are essential contributions to the ability of people everywhere to eat sufficient nutritious food.

As globalization and industrial agriculture push uniformity and convenience, local food traditions are rapidly disappearing. The result? A food system that strains the planet, undermines health, and erodes culture.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), about 3 billion people around the world cannot afford a nutritious diet. Simultaneously, more than 2.5 billion adults are overweight, including 890 million classified as obese. In India, childhood stunting and anemia continue to damage the health of millions.

The global food system is not only failing people, but also the planet. According to the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF), food production accounts for over a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions, uses 70 percent of freshwater, and costs up to $15 trillion annually in health and environmental damage. Within the agricultural sector, excessive reliance on meat production can exacerbate the crisis by harming ecosystems and causing outbreaks of zoonotic disease.

In response to these conditions, a movement is quietly taking root in a forested corner of Maharashtra, India’s second-largest state, which stretches along the country’s western coast. The movement is centered around Govardhan Exchange (GEV).

GEV: Cultivating Change

Nestled in the Sahyadri Hills, GEV is not just a spiritual retreat, but a hub of agroecological innovation. With solar-powered infrastructure, rainwater harvesting, biogas plants, and a rare seed bank, GEV is a living model of sustainability. It holds special consultative status with the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and actively engages in global forums such as the United Nations Environmental Assembly (UNEA-6) and Civil 20 (C20). In 2023, GEV hosted a C20 India conference on food systems, and in 2024, it took a leadership role in the C20 Brazil Working Group on Food Systems, Hunger, and Poverty.

Annapurna Mission: A Vision for Conscious Food Systems

At the heart of GEV’s work is Annapurna Mission, a bold initiative with a vision of building what it calls a Conscious Food System (CFS). CFS is a food system that nurtures both people and the planet. In Hindu mythology, Annapurna is the goddess of food, nourishment, and abundance. Guided by faculty from the Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad and supported by food system experts, the mission blends policy, tradition, and grassroots action. It is grounded in the belief that food should be accessible, affordable, culturally acceptable, and life-affirming.

“Food is not just about nutrition,” says Shri Gauranga Das, Director of GEV. “It is about identity, ecology, equity, and consciousness. Annapurna Mission is our way of bringing that holistic vision into public life.”

Reviving Culture Through Cuisine: The M3T Campaign

Annapurna Mission is turning this vision into action through one of its flagship efforts: Meri Maati Meri Thali (M3T), which means My Soil, My Plate. This national campaign reconnects people to local, seasonal, and traditional foods, addressing today’s most pressing global challenges—malnutrition, climate change, biodiversity loss, and cultural erosion. Inspired by India’s Millet Mission, M3T aims to:

• Promote traditional diets as healthy, climate-smart alternatives
• Celebrate regional culinary identities
• Increase farmer incomes through raising demand for indigenous crops
• Reduce dependency on monoculture and processed foods

In Palghar district, where the campaign is being piloted, GEV has researched native recipes and farming practices. Every weekend, visitors can taste the Madan Mohan Thali at Govindas restaurant. It includes a curated menu of seven heritage dishes, all locally sourced. For many, it’s not just a meal, but a rediscovery.

From Dialogue to Policy: Scaling the Vision

Annapurna Mission is also invested in shaping food system policy. The roadmap includes:

• Stakeholder Consultations: Dialogues with farmers, consumers, spiritual leaders, and policymakers
• Policy Development: Clear, actionable policies based on evidence, experience, and expert consensus
• Thought Leadership: Publishing toolkits, dietary guidelines, and community education materials that inspire action at scale

Over the next few years, Annapurna Mission will focus on expanding its research, advocacy, and implementation footprint, making “conscious food” an aspirational choice across India and beyond.

This is more than food. It is a movement for dignity, ecology, and resilience.

Visit www.ecovillage.org.in to learn more. Eat consciously. Live harmoniously.

Gauranga Das is the director of Govardhan Exchange, which implements the Annapurna Mission initiative in Maharashtra State, India.

The post Annapurna Mission: Reimagining India’s Food Future from the Ground Up appeared first on Bread for the World.

FEWS NET, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network, was established by the U.S. government during the Reagan administration. In the aftermath of the devastating 1984 famine in Ethiopia, the goal was to enable people in communities at risk, national governments, and the international humanitarian assistance community to avoid having to confront future disasters unexpectedly and while unprepared. 

FEWS NET has always been administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). It was shut down in the opening weeks of the Trump administration, and its work to help save lives during hunger emergencies stopped amid the administration’s effort to dismantle USAID.

“[Losing FEWS NET] is like having a truck full of grain but taking the steering wheel away. The FEWS maps are the steering wheel for the aid programs. They tell you where to go.”    

– Andrew Natsios, Administrator of USAID during the George W. Bush administration 

Bread for the World is a longtime supporter of FEWS NET’s work. In the past, this usually took the form of urging policymakers to heed FEWS NET warnings in time to provide effective humanitarian assistance. Three years ago in April 2022, for example, Bread’s piece Improving Responses to Hunger Emergencies explained how FEWS NET supported quicker responses to the hunger crises emerging in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The article pointed out that during the first famine of the 21st century, which took place in Somalia in 2011, the death toll could have been reduced if the global community had responded sooner. An estimated 250,000 people died in this famine, about 130,000 of whom were children under 5. FEWS NET had been warning of an approaching famine for eight months before international aid flights began. On the day in July 2011 when famine was declared, about half of the victims had already died. 

Over the past 40 years, FEWS NET has become increasingly sophisticated in its ability to use the analysis of data from numerous sources to project when and where severe hunger crises would emerge. FEWS NET has a strong track record of providing accurate information on the most likely scenarios up to six months in advance. This analytical work is vital to enabling communities, national governments, and humanitarian officials to be as prepared as possible. 

Large-scale humanitarian assistance programs, in particular, take time to put in place. In some cases, there are a million people, 2 million people, or even more who have been displaced from their land and therefore can no longer grow food for themselves and their families. Common terms such as refugee camps or settlements for displaced people are sometimes misnomers. The places where people take refuge from conflict or climate impacts are often more like small cities. They need many of the public services of cities as well, from clean water and sanitation systems to medical clinics and schools. Securing the financial resources needed, finding sources of needed supplies, and positioning necessities where impacted communities can access them is a time-consuming process. Once planning is underway, local staff need time to begin to build relationships with community leaders. Providers of emergency assistance should work with women, people from minority groups, unaccompanied children, and other key groups whose representation is important—whether they are considered community leaders or not. 

People with experience working in-country express dismay over losing access to FEWS NET, as Ambassador Natsios above has. Evan Thomas, a professor of environmental engineering at the University of Colorado, Boulder, said that closing down FEWS NET is “quite petty – we’re not even spending money to host a website that has data on it, and now we’ve taken that down so that other people around the world can’t use information that could save lives,” he said.

The loss of FEWS NET “compromises our models, and our ability to be able to provide accurate forecasts of ground water use,” said Denis Muthike, a Kenyan scientist and assistant research professor at University of Colorado, Boulder. He said that closing down FEWS NET would affect water usage, pointing out that talking about food security means talking about water security as well. Muthike added that it would take many years to build another monitoring service that could reach the same level of analysis as FEWS NET. 

It is heartening that the world has developed tools that can provide advance warning of hunger crises and other disasters. People from earlier periods in history would surely have appreciated such information. But of course, services such as FEWS NET can only help people if they are available to all—and if donors act on their information in time.

Michele Learner is managing editor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Hunger Hotspots: Identifying Those Most in Need in Time to Help appeared first on Bread for the World.

April is Earth Month. This is a time to appreciate and reflect on the vast and beautiful creation that demonstrates the greatness of God. Our complex, diverse planet is equipped to nourish all people, whether they live in Arkansas or Mozambique. 

Bread for the World’s mission of ending hunger in a lasting way means that we must, first, care for the environment now. Second, we must maintain and improve the health of our planet so that it can nourish its inhabitants for generations to come.

Farmers understand what is needed to maintain healthy ecosystems on and around their farms. They are among those raising the alarm over the recent cancellation of many U.S. policies, programs, and funding that seek to promote healthy ecosystems—ecosystems that are critical to food security. Beyond this, a second major concern is the risk of additional damage to essential programs in the coming months.   

Disruption or elimination of support for essential federal services would have many adverse effects on food security. For example, cuts to weather advisory services means less accurate and less timely weather forecasts. Such budget cuts are already reducing access to forecasting tools such as weather balloons. Accurate information is vital to farmers. It is also particularly important to vulnerable communities, such as people who do not have access to secure shelter. 

Moves to terminate environmental protections that set limits on the levels of pollutants permitted in our national water supplies threaten human lives as well as fields of crops and farm animals. Before long, polluted water begins to cause a range of illnesses, reduces the amount of food that can be grown, and weakens the nutritional status of large swaths of the population. 

Farmers are already being affected by cutoffs of the funding they had been receiving under the Inflation Reduction Act. Thousands of farmers have implemented projects that will enable them to farm more sustainably, such as improving soil health through better grazing management or planting cover crops. Many could lose hundreds of thousands of dollars or be forced out of business if the reimbursements that the federal government agreed to make through the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) do not arrive. Researchers at the University of Illinois found that states such as Texas and Arkansas could bear the most significant losses if farmers are not reimbursed, upwards of millions of dollars.

Adam Chappell, who grows corn, soybeans, and rice in Arkansas, reflected on the impacts of the disruption of established contracts and the uncertainty of future funding.  Chappell pointed out, “When we don’t know if we’re getting reimbursed for things that we’ve already done, bankers don’t like that. And it’s already a high-risk environment. Then when you have all that uncertainty it’s hard to get lenders onboard. And the mental aspect of it has taken a tremendous toll this last three months.” At the time of writing, NRCS funds remain paused.

The administration’s broad cuts to programs and freezes on funding have already had devastating impacts on children and families living in hunger crisis conditions. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that 83 percent of programs implemented by the U.S. Agency for International Development would be terminated.

Just one example of anti-hunger efforts that are now threatened is the Feed the Future Mozambique Resilient Coastal Communities Activity. The project engaged local communities in formulating plans that conserve their coastal environment while still enabling people to access sources of nutritious food such as fish, which is rich in essential nutrients.  

Manuel Sansao, an agribusiness officer affiliated with the project, explains, “In the Memba community, the only activity they used to rely on to earn money was simply fishing. With the entry of the [resilient coastal communities] project, we changed the scenario to introduce more activities – we have already introduced agricultural activities aimed at providing sustenance for their families. Additionally, they can sell the agricultural produce to meet their needs.” 

The project also focuses on enabling local communities to conserve the biodiversity of the coastal ecosystem so that children and future generations will have food security. Domingo Alberto, president of the Memba Community Fishing Council, remarked, “We cannot just think about ourselves when fishing… If we spoil the sea, if we fish only thinking about ourselves, our children, our grandchildren, will not know what trevally or emperor fish are.”

Food and nutrition security go hand in hand with stewarding and caring for the earth. Cuts to programs that conserve and promote the best uses of natural resources to strengthen food security will cost people and the planet both immediately and over the longer term.

The administration and Congress can make progress against hunger by recognizing that caring for the earth means caring for the health of our country and the world.  

Isabel Vander Molen is a junior climate hunger policy advisor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Farms, Fish, and Earth Month: Protecting Nature So It Can Nurture appeared first on Bread for the World.

Climate financing is a particularly dire need for women smallholder farmers struggling with droughts, floods, and other extreme weather events that pose a threat to their livelihoods and economic empowerment. Take Africa for example, a continent that is projected to enjoy a population boom in 2050 from its current 1.5 billion to 2.5 billion, with women and girls making up half this population, but only accounting for 33 percent of its GDP, putting into peril the economic wellbeing of the continent. 

Additionally, this demographic faces some of the most adverse impacts of extreme weather conditions due to lack of access to the resources to address the conditions that impact the integrity of their soil, the micronutrients of their crops, and the resilience of their yields – all stumbling blocks to scaling their agricultural production to market and stimulating their local economy. 

With girls, extreme weather impacts their ability to go to school because of dangerous access issues created by droughts, floods, hurricanes, and extreme heat, making it difficult for them to learn, not to mention the impact on their health. 

The outcomes for COP 29 were clear: tripling finance to developing countries from $100 billion to $300 billion by 2035; scaling up annual finance from public and private sources to $1.3 trillion by 2035; presenting national climate action plans; and establishing transparency reporting and review tools. 

Indeed, all these COP 29 outcomes could have encapsulated robust assessments of what it would cost to invest in women impacted by climate, for example in the agricultural sector and the resources needed to be appropriated to achieve the investment case. Specifically, national climate action plans can be a space to achieve “womanizing” climate finance objectives, country by country for instance. This is a direct way of improving the lives of smallholder farmers, especially since when a climate disaster strikes, four out of five people forced to leave their homes are women. Heartbreakingly, less than a third of the countries that have in place National Adaptation Plans explicitly mainstream gender.

A document entitled “COP agenda item 14 Gender and climate change,” also highlights where gender fared in the COP discussions. While item 14 referenced the Lima Work Programme on Gender (LWPG), most of its language was aspirational, rather than concrete on the amount of climate financing required to address the needs of women and girls, notwithstanding undisputed evidence of how climate is impacting the livelihood and food security of women and girls.

The LWPG was established in 2014 to advance gender balance and integrate gender consideration into the work of the Conference of Parties in implementing the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement so as to achieve gender responsive climate policy and action. Given the encouraging articulation of the objective of the LWPG, it makes logical sense that climate finance should also be gender mainstreamed.

Although the enhanced gender action plan of the LWPG sets out objectives and activities that aim to advance knowledge and understanding of gender-responsive climate action and its coherent mainstreaming in the implementation of the UNFCCC and the work of Parties, United Nations entities, and all stakeholders at all levels, it falls short of articulating the financing amounts to achieve these objectives.

Without clear financing objectives such as were the case with COP 29 for other priorities, $300 billion, 1.3 trillion, etc., gender mainstreaming around, for example, climate adaptation measures in the agricultural sector, which disproportionately impacts women and girls, continue to be a policy objective without teeth. 

But there is hope.

Indeed, many other global moments approach the world in 2025. It will be important for leaders seeking to womanize the climate finance space to pursue clear and pragmatic financial objectives that provide and leverage the resources needed to move the needle. These resources should also reflect an all-of-society effort, from women’s groups at the forefront, to the public and the private sector and inclusive of civil society and faith based organizations. 

A seminal moment, for example, will be the thirtieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women and adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the sixty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women happening in March of 2025. This convening can be a crucial platform for identifying specific amounts of climate finance that enables sustainable food systems for women small holder farmers across the continent of Africa and the globe where women continue to struggle with the challenges of food insecurity due to weather shocks. 

A hopeful effort at the Commission on the Status of Women convening could be factoring a thorough assessment of climate finance challenges and how this affects women and girls’ access to food security, which is key to other empowerment measures, the achievement of gender equality, and how all these put together are important towards the full realizations of the UN sustainable development goals 2, 5, and 13.

In other words, leaders working towards womanizing climate financing for food security should not wait till other global moments such as COP 30 in Brazil and other future COPs, but rather consider identifying concrete financing policy packages during other key moments – moments that are key because of the congregation of subject matter experts.

Abiola Afolayan is director, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post “Womanizing” Climate Financing for Food Security appeared first on Bread for the World.

Bread for the World often mentions that hunger and malnutrition have several root causes, including armed conflict, poverty, economic downturns, inequality, and extreme weather events. There is no single solution to hunger because there is no single cause.

This means that solving a complex problem like hunger requires addressing related socioeconomic conditions as well. This recognition that issues are interdependent led to the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We know, for example, that Bread’s main area of focus—ending hunger and malnutrition—is connected with progress on other SDGs such as gender equity and climate action.

The fact that almost every country has committed to the SDGs is also very important. Despite wide differences in the world, it is a fact that we all share this planet, its resources, and its problems. 

One key strategy to end hunger is to advance a Just Transition. The main goal of a Just Transition is to prioritize workers and critical sectors as the world shifts to more sustainable and fair economic frameworks. Change, even positive change, can disrupt local and national economies. For example, smallholder farmers or people in rural communities may face barriers to obtaining financing, training, or access to programs that help them build resilience to extreme weather events or navigate new sustainability practices. 

Because of these barriers, it is important to prioritize, protect, and empower family farmers and rural communities, helping them produce food while also bearing the brunt of climate shocks. Governments, civil society, and the private sector can work to make food systems more resilient and sustainable, particularly during 2025 in the lead-up to COP-30, the next U.N. global climate conference. 

In an interview with the Inter Press Service, Moises Savian, Brazil’s Secretary of Land Governance, Territorial and Socio Environmental Development at the Ministry of Agrarian Development and Family Farming, highlighted the need to improve access to finance in rural areas.  

Savian noted, “We are formulating a specific national plan for family farming, which constitutes the majority of our rural population. These communities are often the most affected by climate extremes, so public policies are essential. … Without this focus on [rural food system transformation],” he added, “there can be no just transition.”

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated in its 2024 State of Food and Agriculture report that global food systems generate over $11.6 trillion annually in adverse social, health, and environmental costs. These are sometimes known as “hidden” costs because they are often not included as economic costs. Policy interventions that recognize power imbalances and account for environmental damage should be used to reduce these hidden costs.

The report cites examples of how public policy can reduce hidden costs. One is to enact regulatory or financial incentives to adopt sustainable agricultural practices. Another is to design rural livelihoods strategies that minimize, but also include, hidden costs.

Reducing hidden costs and promoting a Just Transition requires policies that elevate farmers into emerging sustainable markets. This is only part of a larger effort to enact national economic strategies that guide industries, workers, and consumers through a transition to resilient food systems that pollute less and nourish more. 

COP30 will take place in the heart of the Amazon in Belem, Brazil. Sustainable food systems will be top of mind because Brazil is both a significant agricultural net exporter and a key player in conservation. Approximately 60 percent of the Amazon rainforest is within Brazil’s borders. These circumstances have shaped Brazil’s approach to ending hunger sustainably, primarily through new economic and market strategies. 

 A New Climate Economy for the Brazilian Amazon, a 2023 report led by the World Resources Institute, articulates how an economic structure that accounts for the social and environmental impacts of economic decisions could help benefit the agricultural sector. The report calls this a socio-bioeconomy.

The World Resources Institute analysis for Brazil found that fully developing a socio-bioeconomy could create an additional 312,00 jobs and preserve an additional 81 million hectares (about 202 million acres) of standing forest by 2050, while also achieving net zero deforestation. Brazil’s socio-bioeconomy plan uses Just Transition principles to ensure that family farmers have equal access to funding and other resources so that they can become climate-resilient rather than climate-vulnerable. Particularly since family farms produce 23 percent of the nation’s goods and employ over half of rural workers, they need access to technologies and tools that can enable them to participate in a Just Transition.

The world is capable of moving more quickly this coming year to end hunger and malnutrition. Governments, civil society, and private agricultural interests should focus on protecting farmers and resources for future generations as they continue to lead, learn, and take action to end hunger and malnutrition. Simultaneously, the global community can learn from successes and challenges in Brazil’s efforts to improve livelihoods and end hunger while protecting the Earth. 

Isabel C. Vander Molen is a Climate-Hunger Fellow at Bread for the World.

The post Moving Forward: A Just Transition for Farmers and Rural Communities appeared first on Bread for the World.

Feeding the 340 million people in the United States is an enormous undertaking. Bread for the World emphasizes the importance of all parts of a healthy food system—each step “from farm to fork.” The country’s agricultural workers are not only a component of the food system that is critical to ensuring that everyone in the country has access to nutritious food, but also a group of people who are at disproportionate risk of hunger, poverty, and exposure to climate impacts. 

There are about 2.4 million agricultural workers in the United States, a number that has not fluctuated significantly since 1990. Construction workers are another large group of people whose work is largely outside, along with roofers, sanitation workers, postal carriers, highway repair teams, and more.   

As climate impacts accelerate, the U.S. government must ensure that outdoor workers are protected. 

Many outdoor workers are members of racial and/or ethnic minority communities. For example, Latinos are about 20 percent of the U.S. workforce, but roughly half of workers in construction (51 percent) and groundskeeping (47 percent).

Agricultural labor, in particular, is usually low-wage work. Both official sources, such as the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and nonprofit organizations, such as the Economic Policy Institute, report that farmworkers are paid about 40 percent less than people with similar nonfarm jobs.

Outdoor workers also face pressure to work regardless of extreme temperatures or other adverse conditions, because they are usually paid only for the hours they work. Lack of paid leave plus the low pay means that people have little choice but to work to put food on the table. 

Many decades of record-keeping on weather and climate conditions have enabled researchers to reach wider conclusions supported by evidence. According to analysis led by scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Earth’s temperature has increased by at least 1.9 degrees F. (1.1 degrees C.) since 1880, with the majority of the increase taking place since 1975.

The Fifth National Climate Assessment, published in 2023, found that since at least 1970, the continental United States has been warming faster than many other parts of the world. 

Despite widespread recognition that the planet’s rising temperatures and other climate changes pose an alarming risk to humanity, we still don’t know enough about the impacts of climate change on human health. 

For example, when people are asked to identify dangerous climate impacts, a common response is potential severe illness or death from excessive heat. Yet there are few large-scale studies of even this frequently mentioned risk. One of the few studies available was published in 2015 and uses data from 2000-2010. At that time, researchers wrote, “Occupational heat-related mortality is not well studied and risk factors remain largely unknown.” 

There is a little more information available about another danger amplified by climate change: wildfires, which occur more frequently than in the past and are often larger and harder to contain. 

Of course, wildfire poses a danger to everyone working in an area where the fire could spread. The other main concern is smoke, which contains tiny particles that can penetrate deep into a person’s lungs. This can increase the risk of respiratory diseases, asthma, and heart problems. 

Health authorities warn people in affected areas to stay indoors. But farmworkers usually cannot afford to take unpaid time off. Employers may also pressure people to work regardless of working conditions. They may give as their reason that longer wildfire “seasons” overlap with peak harvest seasons more frequently than in the past.

 Researchers who studied data from the 2020 Glass and LNU Lightning Complex fires in Sonoma County, California, found that many farmworkers continued to work in the aftermath of the fires, often in zones that had been ordered evacuated. Employers urged people into the fields so as to save as much as possible of the grape harvest before the grapes became contaminated by smoke and ash. 

Researcher Michael Méndez, assistant professor at the University of California-Irvine, reported, “Hundreds of farmworkers were exposed to the toxic air quality of wildfire smoke… There wasn’t any post-exposure monitoring of these farmworkers.” 

Reports like these underscore the need for the U.S. government to do more to protect the health and safety of essential workers. Fair laws that are enforced are needed on many specifics, from the availability of sufficient drinking water to how equipment must be maintained. 

Many outdoor workers already face low pay and poor working conditions simply to put food on the table. Now some are also expected to work in times of excessive heat or dangerous levels of air pollution from smoke. They should be food secure and have adequate workplace safety standards, just as indoor workers should. 

Michele Learner is managing editor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Food Systems, Farmworkers, and Climate Impacts appeared first on Bread for the World.

Clifford Tayong, a 59-year-old farmer from Cameroon’s troubled North-West region, recounted in an interview with the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) that in 2021, members of the Cameroonian military accused him of aiding separatist fighters and burned his one-hectare (2.5-acre) farm, leaving him and his family destitute. 

As Bread for the World has emphasized, hunger has been on the rise for the past several years, and a global hunger crisis continues unabated in 2024.

Although Cameroon, a lower-middle-income country, was not mentioned in the most recent Hunger Hotspots Outlook published by the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), growing numbers of people in Cameroon face acute food insecurity.

Cameroon has been included as a food crisis area in the Global Report on Food Crises since its first edition in 2017. In that 2017 report, about 16 percent of households in Cameroon, or 3.9 million people, were food insecure, and of these, about 1 percent of households, or 211,000 people, were projected to confront severe food insecurity. As of 2023, 3 million people were affected by acute food insecurity—about 11 percent of the population. 

Hunger in Cameroon is driven by several key factors: the arrival of an overwhelming number of refugees from neighboring countries, particularly Nigeria; the displacement of Cameroonians affected by conflict in other parts of the country; and climate shocks. 

Boko Haram is an Islamist militant organization based in northeastern Nigeria. It was founded in the city of Maiduguri in 2002 by Mohammed Yusuf, a prominent Islamist cleric from Nigeria’s Borno state. Originating as a faction of the Salafi movement, a branch of Sunni Islam, the group’s primary objective is to establish a fundamentalist Islamic state governed by sharia law.

Boko Haram has significantly worsened hunger in Cameroon’s far northern region. Attacks within Cameroon forced 70 percent of farmers in the hardest-hit areas—including the local departments of Mayo-Sava, Mayo-Tsanaga, and Logone and Chari—to abandon their fields, creating a drastic reduction in agricultural production. The violence has also shut down local markets and disrupted the movement of goods and people, both of which also damage the local economy and reduce the availability of food.

The influx of Nigerian refugees who, without access to their own land, rely on host communities for food, has strained the available resources. Additionally, government-imposed curfews have limited the time farmers can work their land, further reducing output.

The conflict known as the Anglophone crisis began late in 2016, stemming from grievances over marginalization. It is now marked by ongoing violent clashes between government forces and separatists in the North-West and South-West regions, as well as severe human rights violations. It plays a significant role in exacerbating hunger by displacing farmers, destroying food supplies, and disrupting agricultural efforts in key food-producing regions. The conflict has forced many to abandon their lands, leading to reduced food production and increased prices. Additionally, the ongoing violence and insecurity has caused economic instability and unsafe conditions, which make it difficult for people to access markets and farmlands. 

The combined effects of these factors and the presence of hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people have been severe disruptions of food security. A sizable portion of the population has been left acutely food insecure, and efforts by the government and humanitarian organizations to provide relief have been hindered. 

Shocks due to extreme weather, particularly heavy rainfall and flooding driven by climate change, are another factor that significantly exacerbates hunger in Cameroon. The flooding accelerates soil erosion and leaching, diminishing soil fertility and thus agricultural productivity. Farmers face substantial challenges in maintaining crop yields, working harder for minimal returns. This, in turn, leads to higher food prices. Vulnerable populations, especially women, are disproportionately affected due to their limited and insecure access to land and resources. The recurring nature of these climate shocks, exemplified by the 2020 floods that caused 64 deaths and displaced 160,000 people, further worsens the situation. These disruptions undermine years of efforts to strengthen agriculture, straining the sector and deepening food insecurity.

Cameroon is grappling with severe food insecurity, exacerbated by internal conflicts, external insurgencies, and climate shocks. Violence has left millions of Cameroonians, like farmer Clifford Tayong and his family, destitute. To respond to the problem, two approaches are needed: humanitarian assistance must be scaled up to provide immediate relief, while investment in sustainable agriculture and infrastructure is crucial for long-term food security. 

Resolving underlying conflicts, particularly the Anglophone crisis and the Boko Haram insurgency, is essential. Enhancing market access and implementing climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies are important responses as well. Bread advocates for global policies and programs to reduce hunger, emphasizing the need for both immediate aid and long-term development to build resilient communities.

Aicha Abdoulaye is a climate-hunger intern, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Seeds of Despair: How Conflict and Climate Change Fuel Hunger in Cameroon appeared first on Bread for the World.

Earth Day– April 22—is a day to mobilize people around the world to pursue environmental justice on behalf of all creation. Bread for the World has emphasized that healthy food systems are essential to ending hunger. In turn, strong food systems depend on the well-being of the Earth, its inhabitants, and its environment and climate.

Yet problems within food systems are the main cause of biodiversity loss. Food systems are also a significant cause of pollution and resource degradation, both of which accelerate climate change. Transforming food systems is a key part of meeting three important goals: protecting the planet, improving people’s nutrition, and ending hunger.  To end hunger caused by climate change, U.S. and global leaders must take action to improve food systems and accelerate their environmental stewardship efforts. 

Worldwide, food systems are responsible for 70 percent of all biodiversity loss on land. This is because most large-scale farming operations practice monocropping – the practice of repeatedly planting just one type of crop per season—so that the natural plant and animal variety in a given area is replaced by a single homogenous group. Out of the thousands of edible plant varieties on the planet, just 10 crops provide 83 percent of all harvested food calories.

These commodity crops include corn, soy, and wheat. Most of what is grown is used in the industrial, export, or processing sectors and as animal feed, rather than going directly to feed people—and the share of land used to grow crops directly for human consumption is decreasing. While animal-based foods can be valuable sources of protein, the growing demand for them has made the agriculture and livestock sector the main cause of deforestation. This sector is also the source of 26 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions produced by the food system. 

Commodity crops also have implications for human nutrition. Because they are grown in such large quantities, they are the most readily available and least expensive foods. They are usually high in calories and low in nutritional content. Thus, nutritious foods become an unaffordable luxury for many families. There is a clear link related to overproduction of less nutritious crops, lower prices for meat and for foods made from these crops, and their overconsumption, which is associated with higher risks of diabetes and cardiovascular disease. 

Commodity and monocrop-based food systems contribute to environmental degradation and climate change. Diverse and healthy ecosystems provide a sustainable landscape for farming by filtering freshwater, replenishing soil nutrients, and pollinating a variety of plants. However, commodity-driven and monocrop farming reduce the effectiveness of the many roles played by healthy ecosystems in maintaining conditions necessary for farming, such as revitalizing the fertility of the soil.

Additionally, farmers begin to rely more heavily on stronger pesticides, fertilizers, and industrial inputs to keep their businesses and crops afloat. These inputs contribute to further air and water pollution, other forms of damage to resources, and overall ecosystem fragility. It is therefore important to support improvements in food systems that will align them with nutritional and ecological wellness goals, so that all components reinforce each other. 

Empowering farmers to diversify their businesses by investing in different types of crops and farming methods that complement and work well with natural ecosystems is critical to delivering the best nutritional outcomes and choices for consumers. It is also crucial to ensure that farms and agribusinesses can continue to operate even during a crisis caused by climate change, resource shortages, or other problems. A U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization report on reaching zero hunger while limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius recommends that governments adjust crop subsidies and food taxes so that producers and consumers are encouraged to grow and eat more foods that are nutritious and good for the environment but not yet grown in large quantities. 

Similarly, the 5^th National Climate Assessment, a study of climate change impacts in the United States, recommends diversifying diets to include more produce and nutrient-rich foods to meet national food security, health, and climate goals. These changes could be facilitated by policies in the U.S. farm bill, which governs much of federal food and farm policy.

Adapting farming techniques is just one component of ensuring that food systems are healthy for people and the environment, but it is an essential one. Other important steps to ending hunger include boosting farmers’ access to markets, improving purchasing decisions, and raising consumer awareness. 

Caring for creation means caring for all of creation—human, animal, and plant. The benefits of doing so stem from the fact that their interconnections are symbiotic. Taking actions to make our food systems more biodiverse and to prevent further degradation of resources will ultimately enable our food systems to improve the condition of natural ecosystems and expand people’s access to nutritious foods.

 Isabel Vander Molen is a climate-hunger fellow, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Earth Day Is a Reminder of How Creation Care Can End Hunger appeared first on Bread for the World.

Ending hunger in a sustainable way, a way that lasts, depends on resolving its root causes. Among these contributing factors is climate change, one of Bread for the World’s priority issues.  

A visible sign of climate change is natural disasters that are increasingly severe and happen more frequently. In the past decade, according to World Food Program USA, 1.7 billion people have been impacted by climate disasters. 

Lower-income countries have done little to cause climate change, yet these countries are more vulnerable to climate impacts.  According to William R. Sutton, Global Lead for Climate Smart Agriculture at the World Bank, “About 80 percent of the global population most at risk from crop failures and hunger from climate change are in Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia, where farming families are disproportionately poor and vulnerable.”

These groups of people have the fewest resources to help them recover from disasters. They may have lost family members and homes. The land may no longer be suitable for farming. Essential infrastructure, such as roads or crop storage, may have been destroyed. It may be difficult or impossible for families to replace lost livestock or to buy enough food to last until their replanted crops are ready to harvest. For many families, the only real options are to remain in camps for displaced people or refugees for months or years, or to relocate somewhere where they may know no one. 

Ultimately, it is up to the countries that produce the most greenhouse gases to achieve net zero carbon emissions as quickly as possible. Climate change “mitigation,” or avoiding and reducing emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases, is the type of climate action that will shape life on Earth for current and future inhabitants.

In the meantime, however, effective adaptation actions can reduce the human suffering caused by climate impacts. Climate “adaptation” means adjusting to a changing climate to reduce the risk of harmful effects from actual or expected impacts whether sudden ones like typhoons or slower onset but equally devastating impacts like prolonged drought. Examples of adaptation efforts include establishing early warning systems to help people survive disasters, enforcing building codes to protect homes and schools, and enabling people to reduce their risks by diversifying their ways of earning income. 

The global community has begun to recognize that there are now climate impacts that cannot be reversed or adapted to with our current knowledge. One example is areas where temperatures have risen so high that they are uninhabitable. These impacts will require solutions that go beyond adaptation and mitigation. A fund to respond to the losses and damages incurred by adverse climate shocks was established recently to enable people to address such situations. 

Investments in adaptation can be effective. Bread has long emphasized that hunger is unnecessary. The world produces enough food to go around. Investments in adaptation can complement emergency humanitarian assistance to create the conditions necessary to end hunger for good. 

The strategy of combining climate adaptation and humanitarian assistance has a major problem, however: there is not enough financial support. According to the United Nations Environmental Programme 2023 Adaptation Gap Report, international public finance flows need to be between 10 and 18 times more than their current levels to meet the needs. Further, a very low percentage of climate finance— 4.3 percent— is invested in agrifood systems, yet these systems are the most vulnerable to climate change. 

It is essential to unlock additional financial support for climate adaptation.  One idea is for governments to work in partnership with private sector businesses. Such “blended finance” would entail governments helping to mitigate the risks businesses face in the early phases of projects.  

A potential model for public-private partnerships is the renewable energy sector. Renewable energy is energy derived from natural sources that can be replenished more quickly than it is consumed. It includes wind and solar energy. Government policy support for renewable energy has been a successful combination in expanding the sector and reducing costs. Since 2010, the growth of the sector has been exponential. The cost of solar energy fell by 85 percent in 11 years, between 2010 and 2021.

Public-private partnerships are not a panacea, however. As the U.S. government proposes the establishment of these partnerships under initiatives like the President’s Emergency Plan for Adaptation and Resilience (PREPARE), the criteria for choosing participating companies must prioritize sustainability, transparency, and impact by fully including the local private sector and ensuring that the most vulnerable people benefit from new projects.

Reducing climate change costs—in loss of life, health, and biodiversity, and in damage to infrastructure and crops—depends on closing the adaptation gap by finding ways to encourage more investment in climate solutions for the agrifood sector and beyond.

Isabel Vander Molen is a climate-hunger fellow, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Climate Adaptation Funding to Help End Hunger appeared first on Bread for the World.

It has been more than four months since the 2018 U.S. farm bill expired on September 30, 2023. Fortunately, Congress passed an extension that keeps the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and other key provisions operating until the end of September 2024. 

2023 was the warmest year on record, and evidence from the Fifth U.S. National Climate Assessment shows that the temperature of the United States is rising more quickly than temperatures in some other parts of the world. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) revised its plant hardiness map in 2023. Data showed that nearly half of the country now belongs to a different, hotter plant hardiness zone. The crops that are best suited to grow in these regions have changed since 2012. It is rapidly becoming a necessity for many farmers to transition to new food crops and farming methods as climate change poses an increasing threat to U.S. farmers, agriculture, and long-term food security.

For this reason, one of Bread for the World’s advocacy priorities for the farm bill is increased prioritization and funding for research and programs that help respond to the threat to food security posed by climate change and environmental stressors. Reducing Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions from the U.S. food system, which are the source of about 10 percent of total U.S. GHG emissions, is necessary to slow and then stop climate change and prevent further environmental degradation. In a changing environment, agricultural practices that contribute to resource degradation and emissions must adapt to the challenges of the future. Climate action through conservation farming practices can build agricultural resilience to climate change and limit GHG emissions.

One of the ways the farm bill can do this is through its Title on conservation. The conservation title contains programs for farmers and ranchers to voluntarily adopt environmentally sound farming practices and be compensated for financial or technical burdens that arise as a result. Conservation programs improve the quality of soil and water and protect ecosystems. These elements are essential to securing and maintaining land where people can reliably grow nutritious crops for generations to come.

In 2022, Congress approved the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which allocated billions of dollars to the energy, infrastructure, and agricultural sectors for the purpose of reducing and/or sequestering GHG emissions. 

This IRA funding includes over $18 billion to be divided among several conservation Title programs: the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program, the Conservation Stewardship Program, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, and the Regional Conservation Partnership Program. 

Additional funding for these programs would help the U.S. make long-term investments in creation stewardship and the transformation of our food system to meet the challenges of today and the future. The IRA funding prioritizes techniques that mitigate GHG emissions, meaning farming practices that produce less emissions or even conserve carbon through natural processes. 

Despite the benefits for people and the natural world of funding farm bill conservation programs, a different view of the issue argues that the IRA money should instead be diverted to the commodity titles of the farm bill. Farming is inherently an uncertain endeavor, and climate change is making it riskier and more unpredictable. To engage farmers in evidence-backed solutions that help build sustainable food systems and long-term food security, the United States needs policies and funding that enable farmers to revise some of their agricultural practices.

Although the final farm bill has not yet been passed, Bread continues to advocate for programs within it that respond to both immediate hunger and the risk of hunger in the near future in this country. The IRA funding of $18 million should remain in the conservation title programs so that the farm bill can support farmers who choose innovation—a choice that will help guarantee long-term food security in the face of climate change.

Isabel Vander Molen is a climate-hunger fellow, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post A Farm Bill for the Future appeared first on Bread for the World.

Unpredictable weather is only one aspect of climate change, but it produces signs that are hard to miss—ranging from fields with crops that are withered from drought, to stored grains ruined by flooding, to swarms of destructive insects who prefer the new warmer temperatures, to more frequent and intense sudden-onset disasters such as wildfires and hurricanes.  

Other types of damage caused by climate change may be less noticeable from a day-to-day vantage point, but they are also devastating. One of these is the growing number of people being forced to leave their homes and farms in search of food and a more viable way of earning a living. Another is the impact of higher carbon dioxide concentration in the soil, with consequences for the nutritional quality of crops. Climate scientists, nutritionists, and other specialists do not yet understand all the implications for human nutrition. 

We know, however, that among the people most at risk from malnutrition are two groups that frequently overlap: people who have been displaced either within or outside their home countries; and pregnant women and young children. 

According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), for example, disasters linked to climate change can “translate into significant – and negative – nutritional outcomes, including foregone calories and nutrients.”

Researchers at FAO have estimated the potential impact of disasters on the calories available to each person, basing their calculations on data on crop and livestock production loss in least developed, low-income, and middle-income countries between 2008 and 2018. The result was startling—6.9 trillion lost kilocalories per year, or enough calories to feed 7 million adults.

Scientists also worked to calculate the potential loss of specific essential nutrients, including iron, zinc, calcium, Vitamin A, and iodine. The result for loss of nutritional iron, for example, was estimated as enough to meet the needs of 45 million women. Deficiencies in essential vitamins and minerals can lead to serious health problems—such as blindness or developmental disabilities— or even death. In fact, iron deficiency anemia is a leading contributor to maternal mortality.

There has been increasing recognition over the past 15 years that the period from pregnancy to a child’s second birthday, often known as the “1,000 Days,” is the most critical window for human nutrition. Malnutrition is the cause of nearly half of all deaths among children under 5, and those who survive malnutrition during the 1,000 Days often suffer permanent damage to their health and development, a condition known as stunting.

Because climate change has led to increasing numbers of babies and toddlers who have been displaced along with their families, it is increasingly important for national governments and the global humanitarian assistance community to identify and implement the most effective ways to protect young children. Groups such as the Infant Feeding in Emergencies (IFE) Core Group promote collaboration among stakeholders seeking to do this. 

One effective way of protecting the youngest children during hunger emergencies is continued breastfeeding. According to Colleen Emary, senior technical advisor for nutrition with World Vision, most malnourished mothers will continue to produce breastmilk that meets their babies’ nutritional needs. Milk production will decline only in the most severe cases of malnutrition. 

Emary noted that support for breastfeeding is a priority action in the Sphere Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response. “Policy makers, donors, humanitarian responders, community leaders, and crisis-affected communities all have a role to play in ensuring support for breastfeeding mothers in emergencies,” she pointed out. 

Supporting breastfeeding includes ensuring that pregnant women and lactating mothers are prioritized for nutritious foods in humanitarian assistance efforts, including post-disaster response. This is more important than ever in the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic. According to UNICEF, between 2020 and 2022, malnutrition among pregnant and breastfeeding women increased by an estimated 25 percent in 12 of the hardest hit countries.

Michele Learner is managing editor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.  

The post Hunger Hotspots: Protecting Nutrition in the Era of Climate Change appeared first on Bread for the World.

Another sign is that unusual weather patterns, including more severe natural disasters, are more common. Communities around the world are at greater risk of floods, hurricanes, droughts, wildfires, and other catastrophes. 

As Bread for the World emphasizes, it is lower-income nations, most of whom produce very low levels of the greenhouse gases that cause climate change, that are suffering most. The United States is not immune, however. For example, many western states experienced severe drought in 2021 and 2022.

The world, particularly countries that are among the top producers of greenhouse gases, has done too little to stop or slow climate change. Countries and communities will continue to face climate impacts. Agriculture and food systems—which are often dependent on climate conditions like rainfall—are particularly vulnerable to these impacts. This is why Bread advocates for increased support for climate adaptation in lower-income countries, especially for communities dependent on farming. Climate adaptation includes a wide range of activities to help ensure that, despite facing climate impacts, people are able to feed their families, protect their health, earn a living, and otherwise thrive.  

One promising way of enabling farmers to adapt is to invest in the research and development of seeds and crops that can survive and thrive under drought conditions. These are often called “climate-resilient” varieties. For example, maize (corn) is an important basic food in many countries. The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), headquartered in Mexico, has been studying ways of formulating maize seeds that are climate resilient. As a result of the research, there is now a breed that has produced a harvest of between 5 percent and  25 percent more than standard maize, even under drought conditions.

CIMMYT is one part of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), a global partnership aimed at conducting research for a food-secure future. The goal is to improve basic crops such as maize, wheat, and sorghum, so that smallholder farmers will have more secure livelihoods and their communities’ food systems will be more productive and inclusive.  

Farming has always been an uncertain way of making a living. Even without climate change, so much is beyond human control. The majority of people in many lower-income countries—including the majority of people living with hunger—still work in agriculture. Agricultural insurance is a tool that can help farmers when climate extremes disrupt their crops or livestock. As with other types of insurance, farmers pay premiums, and later their insurance compensates them for climate-related losses. This ensures that farmers are able to keep feeding their families. They are also more likely to have what they need to farm in the next growing season. 

Farming and other human endeavors have changed the landscape of many parts of the world, often in ways that make extreme, highly destructive flooding more likely. For example, in 2022, flooding in the Sindh Province of Pakistan was expected to destroy 80 percent of the rice harvest. 

Deforestation, mainly to expand the land available for cattle ranching, has claimed about 17 percent of the Amazon Rainforest over the past 50 years. Trees and shrubs help prevent flash floods since more rainfall is absorbed into the ground. This is why planting or replanting trees and shrubs and integrating them into farmed lands—known as agroforestry—can help reduce the damage caused by the increased likelihood of flooding.

Climate-resilient agriculture, agricultural insurance, and agroforestry are just a few of many strategies for adapting to climate change that could potentially help smallholder farmers keep producing food for themselves and their communities, despite climate change. 

But all of them require funding, and the world is not doing enough. Only about 1.7 percent of all climate finance goes to help smallholder farmers adapt to climate change. The U.S. and other high-income countries should increase funding for efforts that are so essential to ending hunger.

Jordan Teague Jacobs is co-director, Policy & Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post How can smallholder farmers adapt to climate change? appeared first on Bread for the World.

Bread for the World’s new campaign Nourishing Our Future emphasizes preventing and ending hunger among children. It is extremely important to take action to minimize the harm that climate change is currently causing children because, as Bread has pointed out, climate change is a leading cause of global hunger among children and adults alike.

Nearly half of the world’s children live in countries that are at extremely high risk from climate change. Whether climate change takes the form of a sudden disaster (such as a hurricane) or a slow-onset climate shock (such as drought), it affects hundreds of millions of children. It is not difficult to see how, when climate impacts are combined with preexisting social and economic problems, the most vulnerable children can be pushed into deeper hunger, malnutrition, and poverty. 

Losing access to essential resources can easily create a cycle of vulnerability, because these are the things that enable children to build up their resilience and their capacity to adapt to difficult circumstances. As the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) points out, the climate crisis is a children’s rights crisis. UNICEF describes the multitudes of ways the climate crisis can impact children specifically and has created a Children’s Climate Index. Already, for example, the education of an estimated 40 million children is disrupted every year, whether from physical destruction of schools or impassible routes to walk there, or less directly from being forced to drop out of school to earn even minimal extra income to help their families survive because of the impact of climate change. 

The families most at risk of being forced to leave their homes in search of food are those who had the fewest material resources to begin with, especially those whose governments have little capacity to meet their emergency needs.  The quickening pace of climate-induced displacement and migration is because increasing numbers of people are caught in desperate situations with few options. 

Approximately 32 million people were internally displaced by disasters in 2022. In displacement contexts, children are at increased risk of family separation, trauma, loss of access to education, exploitation and abuse, and violence.

Acting to Protect Children

Bread recommends actions that the United States can take to help reduce the toll of climate change on children. Some are included here, while others will be discussed in future articles on child hunger and climate change.

As most people now understand, the U.S. and other top producers of greenhouse gas emissions must reduce them as quickly as possible, reaching net zero emissions by 2050 at the latest. The consequences of not doing so are, in one word, grim. Exactly how climate change will affect migration depends, of course, on the world’s success in reducing emissions, but the U.N. International Organization on Migration (IOM) reports that by 2050, as many as 216 million people could be forcibly displaced within their own countries.  

The U.S. can contribute to closing funding shortfalls for low-income countries. As Bread and many others have argued, the communities suffering the most from climate change are those who have contributed the least to greenhouse gas emissions. A good example is Madagascar, whose 2022 hunger crisis was caused largely by climate change, although its greenhouse gas emissions are less than 0.01 percent—that’s one in 10,000—of the world total.

One fund established recently is the Loss and Damage Fund (LDF). Countries that are eligible to receive resources from the LDF are developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change.

But the needs far outweigh the projected funding available. Climate adaptation includes a wide range of actions taken to build resilience to climate change impacts—for example, using drought-resistant seeds or improving weather advisory systems. The cost estimate to build resilience sufficiently to protect the populations of low-income countries is more than $194 billion annually.

The United States could also facilitate debt relief for low-income countries that urgently need to take climate adaptation measures. Enabling governments to spend more on social safety systems would help build children’s resilience to climate shocks. According to UNICEF’s model, improved health and nutrition services could considerably reduce overall climate risk for 460 million children. 

Isabel Vander Molen is a climate-hunger fellow, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Children Pay the Price of Climate Change  appeared first on Bread for the World.

Bread for the World continually points out the inequities inherent in climate change. It is mainly low-income countries with the fewest resources to respond, whose emission levels are very low, that are now facing the most severe climate impacts. 

The United States was among the earliest nations to industrialize on a wide scale. Our country has produced the highest cumulative total of greenhouse gases across the industrial era, from 1750 onward. However, China is currently the top producer of greenhouse gases, unsurprising for a nation of 1.4 billion people.

The US. has two responsibilities in the worldwide effort to slow and then stop climate change: reduce our greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible, and act now to help the people and countries most affected. 

In March 2023, the U.S. Agency for International Development published its Policy Framework: Driving Progress Beyond Programs. It identifies several priority objectives aimed at solving complex problems—literally going beyond humanitarian and development assistance “programs” to find longer-term solutions. The Framework lists “helping countries withstand the effects of a changing climate and secure a net-zero future” as one of five pressing generational challenges it will help to meet by 2030. The ambitious action items include enabling 500 million people to manage climate impacts and accelerating the availability of climate financing. 

This holistic approach is essential to working in true partnership with communities facing serious climate-related problems. One such collaboration brings the U.N. Development Program (UNDP) together with local community initiatives in the mountains of Pakistan.

It might seem that the Himalayas, one of the tallest mountain ranges on Earth, would be protected from climate change, at least for a few more years. But the area is receiving less snow than in the past, leading to shrinking waterways. Scientists at the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), an intergovernmental body studying climate change in Asia’s mountains, agree with residents that the area needs a new water source in order for people to continue farming.  

An old ritual in some local communities was “glacier mating,” which involvedcombining chunks of ice gathered from far-flung locations. These were traditionally considered to represent male and female, making it possible to create an entirely new glacier. 

A group of local people decided that climate change made glacier mating worth a try. It was far from an easy task. The new glacier needed ice gathered from different locations, each several days’ walk away. Next, the ice had to be carried several hundred feet up into the mountains to an elevation where it would not melt. This is one of the steps that make “glacier mating” a scientifically sound endeavor, according to Knut Ostby, resident representative for UNDP in Pakistan. Traditionally, it would take 12 years for a new glacier to take root and an additional 12 years to grow.

Another problem is that rapid glacier melt creates more dangerous avalanches.There are more avalanches than before, said Ejaz Karim, head of emergency management for the Agha Khan Agency for Habitat in Pakistan. Moreover, 80,000 residents live in areas that are already considered too dangerous for people to inhabit.

Another group of people has been experimenting with “avalanche harvesting,” which aims to protect villages from increasingly frequent and powerful avalanches by trapping rocks far above in nets made of thick iron wire bolted into the mountain stone. 

It is up to industrialized countries like the United States, which caused a disproportionate amount of the harms from climate change that we see today, to reduce their emissions. Our country must also support the hardest-hit communities in every way possible as people work to find and implement solutions in the areas where they themselves can shape the outcomes. 

Michele Learner is managing editor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World. 

The post Local Communities Find Ways to Cope with Climate Change  appeared first on Bread for the World.

Bread for the World recognizes the role of climate change as a top cause of global hunger through impacts such as more frequent and prolonged droughts and floods; reduced food quantity and nutrient quality; and a loss of livelihoods that forces people to abandon their homes. Confronting climate change is essential to ending hunger in Africa since farming employs about half of sub-Saharan Africa’s workforce, and parts of the continent, particularly the Sahel countries just south of the Sahara, are among the world’s most vulnerable areas to climate change and hunger. 

The inaugural Africa Climate Summit, held September 4-6, 2023, in Nairobi, Kenya, set out to draw attention and attract international investment to African climate solutions and innovations. During the summit, stakeholders from the United States, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Germany joined other governments in announcing commitments to invest in new climate programs. The United States announced that it would provide an additional $20 million to the African Adaptation Initiative (AAI) Food Security Accelerator, which is intended to increase private sector investments in food security innovations. The Nairobi Declaration presented Africa’s common positions and calls to action in the lead-up to COP 28 in late 2023.

At the same time as its accomplishments have been noted, the Summit has also received criticism for problems with equity and ownership. At the conclusion of their side event held during the Climate Summit, interfaith leaders from across Africa released an Africa Climate Summit Statement of Faith in response to the Nairobi Declaration. The Faith Statement highlighted issues that faith leaders believed had not been sufficiently addressed, among them equity in financing for climate adaptation and food security in Africa. 

According to faith leaders, despite the large numbers of farmers and farm laborers in Africa and the ongoing threat to food security posed by climate change, there was minimal discussion of these issues in the Nairobi Declaration. The language in the Nairobi Declaration on climate change solutions related to food and agriculture lacked specificity. In response, the faith group called for African leaders to  “prioritize climate change coping strategies featured in various agricultural methods such as agroecology, conservation, and adaptive agriculture.”  Prominent faith-based organizations such as Tearfund, Christian Aid, and ClimateYES joined in support of the urgent need to promote food sovereignty and ensure that agricultural policies prioritize local communities and environments to make Africa more resilient to climate shocks and resulting hunger crises. 

The faith leaders stated that global north leaders should “move past announcements to delivery on commitments made.” Notably, there are previous climate finance commitments to developing countries that have not been met. These include European and U.S. commitments to mobilize $100 billion annually to fight climate change as well as lagging U.S. investments in the Green Climate Fund.

Equitable funding and local leadership in inclusive efforts are both essential for true collaboration with African communities to end hunger. Funding commitments for agriculture and climate resilience, such as the investment in the AAI Food Security Accelerator announced by the United States, must be honored.  Further, including the voices of the African faith community is critical for just, equitable, and sustainable development, because these leaders align with and represent local communities.  

African organizations, both faith-based and secular, are demanding to be more involved in international climate change talks. For example, an Africa People’s March after the Climate Summit brought together more than 500 local civil society organizations and was joined by the faith leaders who had convened during the Summit. The march was held to protest the insufficiency of the climate solutions discussed at the Climate Summit. 

The legacy of colonialism, racism, and unjust global financial structures continues to hinder efforts to end hunger and enable communities to adapt to climate change. During the faith leaders’ meeting, Ezekiel Lesmore from the All Africa Conference of Churches argued that climate change issues shouldn’t be politicized or reduced to economic justifications; instead, they must be treated seriously, as a matter of life and death. 

Bread continues to advocate for holistic hunger solutions and equitable climate finance for countries facing hunger and climate change crises. The recent Faith Leaders’ Summit in Nairobi exemplifies the role faith groups are playing as representatives of local communities in international discussions of climate change and hunger. At the same time, governments and other global actors need to consciously include faith groups in such discussions. 

In the words of the Faith Statement released at the conclusion of the Africa Climate Summit, thoughtful adoption of such principles will help ensure that we can together “have the power to restore what has been destroyed” and “heal what has been wounded.”

Isabel Vander Molen is the Climate Hunger Fellow, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

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August 19 is also a celebration of the courage and resilience of people trying to survive a war or rebuild their lives after a natural disaster as well as those who risk their own safety to help them. Each year, WHD focuses on a theme to bring together communities to advocate for the well-being of people affected by crises and for the safety of aid workers. This year’s theme is “It takes a village.”

Through the biblical story of the Samaritan, we learn that mercy, compassion, generosity, and hospitality can restore the human dignity of an anonymous girl, boy, woman, or man abandoned at the side of the road and urgently in need of help. WHD celebrates today’s Samaritans—people around the world who sacrifice time with their loved ones and often put their lives at risk to bring lifesaving assistance and hope to people who are suffering. 

Bread members’ commitment to act, pray, and give helps ensure the passage of U.S. policies and programs aimed at ending hunger. Bread supports measures that enable people living with hunger and humanitarian workers to continue to look ahead and see a path to food security, dignity, and peace.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) manages the events around World Humanitarian Day, which was established to commemorate the 22 humanitarian workers killed in an attack in Iraq on August 19, 2003. Among the dead was Sergio Vieira de Mello, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Iraq.

Humanitarian work remains dangerous. Several factors contribute to the higher death and injury tolls among aid workers that we see today. The first is a matter of numbers: more armed conflict around the world has led to record numbers of people who need assistance. This, in turn, puts more humanitarian workers in the field, often in isolated areas. Second, armed groups often splinter into smaller and smaller factions, each of which poses a threat to civilians and aid workers. 

Third, there is growing disregard for international humanitarian law and principles. Historically, humanitarian organizations have been seen as neutral parties that should be respected because they are there to help people regardless of “whose side they’re on.” Today, sometimes the reverse seems to be true: hospitals and food distribution sites are targets, seen as enabling the enemy to continue fighting.  

Attacks on aid workers in 2021 (the most recent data available) were deadlier than in any year since 2013: 141 reported fatalities. In addition, 203 humanitarian workers were wounded and 117 were kidnapped. South Sudan remained the most violent context for aid workers, followed by Afghanistan, Syria, Ethiopia, and Mali. In April 2023, several aid workers were killed in the first month of the war in Sudan, including three WFP employees on the second day of the conflict. 

Humanitarian assistance groups reported that fighting erupted in Sudan’s capital city, Khartoum, on April 15, 2023. Armed conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces quickly spread across the country. Nearly a million people were displaced in just the first month of the war–730,000 people within the Sudan and more than 200,000 in neighboring countries. By August 2, displaced people and refugees exceeded 3 million.

Through an ongoing breakfast briefing series at Bread, we have been listening, learning, and lifting up the voices of humanitarian workers and the people they serve in hunger hotspots such as Haiti, Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh, Honduras, and Mali. As we have heard, humanitarian workers in-country are faced with challenges that include resource constraints, risks to their personal safety, and the emotional toll of witnessing widespread human suffering. 

We hope to continue to lift up voices from the 18 current hunger hotspots, which include 22 countries. Their stories inspire Bread members and coalition partners to continue our advocacy for policies, such as those in the U.S. farm bill, that will save lives and help people rebuild their communities.

Learn more about how all people can celebrate World Humanitarian Day 2023—before, on, and after August 19—on the campaign’s website. Materials include suggested actions, updates, and more.  

Abiola Afolayan is co-director, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

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As a pastor, Robinson views climate change through the lens of creation care. Creation care—stewardship of God’s creation—is an integral part of Christian discipleship, and climate change is a quintessential failure to fulfill stewardship responsibilities. 

The ever-worsening devastation caused by climate change has made it one of the top causes of global hunger (another is conflict). Reversing the spike in global hunger of the past several years, particularly since 2020, will require slowing climate change and enabling people to adapt to its impacts. 

Not long after she was installed as pastor at Audubon Park Church in 2013, Robinson was invited to participate in Bread for the World’s Hunger Justice Leaders Program. She was already a rising star in the Evangelical Covenant Church. The Hunger Justice Leaders Program was established to cultivate young anti-hunger leaders from around the nation. Robinson is among the many Hunger Justice Leaders “alumni” who have stayed involved with Bread as committed anti-hunger advocates in their communities.

Living in Florida, Robinson has been witnessing firsthand the accelerating effects of climate change and the resulting consequences for food security in her community. Audubon Park Church has established a vegetable garden on its property, which enables it to provide healthy foods to households in the community who struggle to afford enough on their own. Both globally and locally, the people who have the least access to healthy food are also the people who are first to suffer from the impacts of climate change. 

From her earliest involvement with Bread, Robinson has been encouraging the organization to highlight the impact of climate change on hunger. She is delighted to see Bread doing that in the 2023 Offering of Letters campaign on the farm bill, which is up for another five-year reauthorization by Congress. Bread is championing policies that would reduce food loss and waste in the U.S. food system. This is an important part of farm bill advocacy – not only because food that goes to waste contributes significantly to climate change, but also because much of the food that would otherwise be lost can be rescued by hunger relief organizations and distributed to families that are struggling to put food on the table. 

In October 2022, Bread for the World invited Robinson to participate in a Convocation on Climate and Hunger in Nairobi, Kenya. The convocation included Christian leaders from Africa, Europe, and North America. Robinson helped to write the statement that summed up the commitment made by participants in the Convocation. 

“As Christians,” the statement reads, “we share a fierce resolve to stand and work together to end the hunger crisis made worse by climate instability, to renew God’s creation, and to bring our planet into balance, forming a beloved community in which all of creation can thrive.”

Todd Post is senior domestic policy advisor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

The post Pastor Sarah Robinson: A Faithful Voice on Climate Change and Hunger appeared first on Bread for the World.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) Synthesis Report: Climate Change 2023, released in March, names threats to food security posed by climate change. These include agricultural and ecological droughts, intense tropical cyclones, and reductions in Arctic Sea ice, snow cover, and permafrost.

Climate scientists warn that to avoid catastrophic consequences, the world must limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees C. (2.7 degrees F.) over preindustrial levels. The most vulnerable and under-resourced communities contribute least to climate change but suffer most from its impacts. These hardships include food insecurity and international debt.

Bread for the World emphasizes that climate change is one of the main causes of hunger. The leadership, commitment, and investment of the global community to prevent and mitigate the worst impacts of climate change is essential to ensure that all people are treated equitably and have opportunities to develop livelihoods that will support their families.

Just ahead of Earth Day, the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund (IMF), both international financial institutions, held their Annual Spring Meetings, with more than 30 planned events related to climate finance, food security, and international debt relief. The World Bank, as part of one of the world’s largest public international financial institutions, is an important participant in ongoing efforts to respond to climate change, its impact on food security, and how these issues intersect with the international debt obligations of most vulnerable and under-resourced countries.

At these spring meetings, finance ministers and other policymakers from most countries around the world discussed financing needs and priorities at the local, regional, and global levels—initiatives that will promote global economic security and cooperation. The World Bank’s proposed Evolution Roadmap was the basis for many of these discussions.

The roadmap emphasizes the importance of responding to the impacts of climate change on global peace and prosperity. The World Bank recognizes that it must play a leadership role in shifting attention from traditional topics such as models of economic growth, trade negotiations, and balance of payments, to the impacts of climate change, food insecurity, fragility, debts owed by the most vulnerable and under-resourced countries, and the COVID-19 global pandemic.

The Evolution Roadmap includes discussion of issues that are also prominent in the recent IPCC report, such as how climate impacts such as floods, droughts, and locust invasions threaten the food security of hundreds of millions of people. The roadmap seeks to foster collaboration among the Bank’s country shareholders, clients, and partners to be able to do more on global public goods such as the environment.

One of Bread’s key points for the World Bank Group and IMF convenings, which are important marketplaces of ideas, is that a country’s international debt obligation must not increase hunger among its people. This is what happened in Sri Lanka in 2022. The government of Sri Lanka defaulted on its international debt. This created an economic crisis whose impacts included a 90 percent increase in food prices that left more than a quarter of the country’s 22 million people food insecure. 

International financial institutions need to step in and take action to reduce hunger and other suffering among people in vulnerable and under-resourced countries with emerging economies. According to experts, outcomes like that of Sri Lanka may be inevitable in such economies under existing structures and policies. Improvements to the proposed roadmap through consultations and feedback from civil society are important for addressing debt relief to protect people from hunger and providing localized climate financing to protect the planet and abate climate driven hunger.

Abiola Afolayan is co-director of the Policy and Research Institute with Bread for the World.

The post Investing in the Planet is Investing in Global Food Security appeared first on Bread for the World.

In recent years, Bread has emphasized that climate change and hunger are inextricably linked, and climate change is one of the main causes of hunger. On March 20, the first day of spring, following one of the warmest winters on record, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) convened and released its sixth assessment report. It is a grim analysis of the status of global climate change and the progress of international efforts to slow and eventually stop global warming.

The IPCC is the world’s leading body of scientists studying climate change. It has produced status reports since 1990. In this most recent assessment, the scientists do not mince words: 

 “There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future.” 

Although everyone, particularly national and international leaders, should take the warnings seriously, it is perhaps equally important to look at the many opportunities that the report highlights. There are tools that have already been developed that can help avert catastrophic outcomes such as soaring numbers of people facing hunger. Some of these tools are no doubt familiar—for example, increasing access to renewable energy while reducing use of fossil fuels—while others are probably not as widely known. 

One strategy we want to highlight is reducing food waste. We have discussed this in previous editions of Institute Insights, but now is a time to revisit the possibilities for progress, because reducing food waste is a key component of Bread for the World’s advocacy campaign for reauthorization of the U.S. farm bill. Congress is expected to take up the legislation this year.  

So how does food waste contribute to climate change? The fact is that the food system “from farm to fork” includes producing, processing, packaging, and transporting food before we bring it home from the supermarket. When food is wasted, all of the energy used in these processes is also wasted. Most of this energy is produced with fossil fuels, which generate enormous amounts of the heat-trapping greenhouse gases that cause global warming. 

Then there’s the consumer side of the climate change ledger. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Americans toss out a lot of the food they purchase, much of it perfectly safe to eat, and it ends up in landfills. In fact, food is the largest share of solid waste in landfills. There is a major problem: as food breaks down in landfills, it emits methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas that has 80 times as much impact on the planet’s temperature as the same amount of carbon dioxide. 

There is more than one way to reduce food waste. In Bread’s farm bill campaign, we are focused on food recovery as part of the solution. Food recovery focuses on nutritious foods such as fruits and vegetables. The goal is to make it easier for nonprofits and others to provide these foods to lower-income households who otherwise would not be able to afford fresh, healthy foods, would not have nearby places to buy them, or both. 

Food recovery is a burgeoning movement in the United States, although many of those reading this will know that gleaning (one example of food recovery) has existed since Biblical times. After the crowds were fed and satisfied in The Feeding of the Five Thousand, Jesus instructed the disciples to gather the broken pieces of bread that were left, ensuring that nothing went to waste.

According to ReFED, the leading source for information on U.S. food waste, the country generated 54.2 million tons of food waste in 2019, the most recent year for which we have data. What is the impact on climate change? It’s the equivalent of more than 6 billion gallons of gasoline. 

In 2016, the federal government set a goal to cut U.S. food waste in half by 2030. Progress has been slow and proactive leadership is needed. Too much of the burden of cutting food waste has been shifted to nonprofits and the private sector. 

The farm bill reauthorization in 2023 is a prime opportunity to increase support for efforts to reduce food waste and promote food recovery. The farm bill is reauthorized every five years, and each one builds on the last. The 2018 farm bill was the first to dedicate resources to reduce food waste, laying the groundwork for expansion in 2023. There is more reason to be optimistic. The 2023 reauthorization is shaping up to be an instrument for advancing climate policy. As fans of Earth Day, we know this is how it should be.

Write your members of Congress and encourage them to support efforts to reduce food waste and promote food recovery in the farm bill. 

Todd Post is senior domestic policy advisor, Policy and Research Institute, with Bread for the World.

This article appears in the April 2023 edition of Bread for the World’s Institute Insights newsletter. Institute Insights provides an in-depth look at the causes of hunger and malnutrition and offers potential solutions to address them. Click here to sign up for the monthly Institute Insights newsletter.

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Today, more than 40 million Americans struggle to put food on the table. And Black households in the U.S. experience food insecurity at three times the rate of white households. 

King’s statements are part of a chorus of leaders and grassroots activists that have spoken up about hunger and poverty throughout time. From Marian Wright Edelman’s efforts to reduce child poverty to Ertharin Cousin’s work in the World Food Programme, there are many who have made strides to help end hunger.

Bread for the World continues to build upon those efforts. Moved by faith and God’s redemptive love, our organization has long advocated for Black freedom from hunger. We join the chorus of Black voices to help address racial inequities, food insecurity, and issues caused by climate change in Black communities in the U.S., Africa, and other parts of the world.  

In acting out our mission, we underscore the need for effective food systems to address disproportionate hunger rates among Black populations. In this article, we will look at the state of hunger among Black populations, the role climate change plays, and how effective food systems can help reduce hunger. 

The State of Hunger in Black Communities

What is the hunger rate among Black populations? 

Hunger Rates in the United States

Black communities consistently face hunger at disproportionate rates. This is often due to historical discrimination, along with social, economic, and environmental challenges. 

According to the U.S.  Department of Agriculture, nearly 20 percent of Black households in the U.S. experienced food insecurity in 2021 — over three times the rate of white households. 

Black children are also more likely to experience hunger than other children: While more than 1 in 5 U.S. children are at risk of hunger, the rate is 1 in 3 among Black children. In 2021, Black children were almost three times as likely to face hunger as white children, and 22 percent of Black children lived in food-insecure households.

Moreover, 2020 Census data shows the U.S. has an overall poverty rate of 11.4 percent, but within the Black community, the poverty rate is 19.5 percent. In other words, economic disparities are significantly high within Black communities and linked to food insecurity. It can be difficult to budget for enough nutritious food when living from paycheck to paycheck or underemployed.

Bread for the World’s 2023 state fact sheets give a local-level snapshot of poverty and hunger in the United States, and have highlighted once again that food insecurity exists throughout the country. What’s more, Feeding America’s most recent Map the Meal Gap research study included rates for several racial and ethnic groups. It found that disparities can vary significantly by population and place; and that while nearly 40 percent of the food insecure population in the U.S. is white, Black individuals are more likely to live in food insecure households.

Key takeaways:

• Black Americans overall are experiencing hunger at disproportionate rates.
• Black children in the U.S. are more likely to experience hunger than children of other backgrounds.
• Economic disparities are a major cause of food insecurity among the Black populations in the U.S.

Global Hunger Rates

Globally, more than one-third of people living with hunger live in Africa. The region has the highest prevalence of undernourishment, which is 21 percent of the continent’s population — more than double the rate in all other regions of the world. The World Economic Forum reports that “the main drivers of hunger [in Africa] include conflicts, climate change, and the COVID-19 pandemic.”

The situation in Somalia is particularly concerning, where near-famine levels of hunger are threatening millions. The country’s last famine, in 2011, led to the deaths of 260 million people, half of whom were children under 5. 

People in Somalia have endured decades of political instability and violence due to armed conflict, leading to alarming levels of life-threatening hunger and malnutrition. The problem has been exacerbated in recent years by climate changes that have caused damage to the local environment and economy.

Hunger rates in several other African countries are considered to be at an emergency level by the World Food Programme, including in Burkina Faso, Madagascar, Mali, Nigeria, Niger, South Sudan, Ethiopia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Conflicts, climate change, and economic inequality have slowed progress on reducing hunger in these nations. For example, more frequent severe weather and droughts have hurt farmers’ ability to produce enough food.

Additionally, many people experiencing poverty and hunger in sub-Saharan Africa live in rural areas and make their livelihoods off the land. Decades of underdevelopment and underinvestment in agricultural infrastructure have impeded their farming capabilities as well.   

Key takeaways:

• People throughout Africa are experiencing hunger at disproportionate rates. 
• The main drivers of hunger in Africa include conflicts, climate change, and the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Near-famine levels of hunger are threatening millions in Somalia; 
• Hunger rates in several other African countries are considered at an emergency level, including in Burkina Faso, Madagascar, Mali, Nigeria, Niger, South Sudan, and Ethiopia 

The Impact of Climate Change

What impact does climate change have on Black communities?

Climate change is the greatest environmental challenge the world has ever faced. It is damaging crops, threatening water security and safety, and disrupting access to food for millions. This is especially true for Black communities and other populations that are disproportionately impacted by hunger. 

Impact of Climate Change in Africa

The African continent is at an exceptionally high risk of the consequences of climate change, despite only producing about 3.8 percent of annual global CO2 emissions. And as soon as the 2030s, climates and weather trends in many African countries are expected to be impacted. 

The negative results of climate change are already being felt by farmers who grow food in Kenya and across the continent. Climate-related disasters, like flooding and drought, have devastated food supplies and critical infrastructure. This has repeatedly caused disastrous effects on the most vulnerable communities.

Recognizing the need to address climate change and its impact on people experiencing hunger in Africa and worldwide, Bread for the World hosted a Convocation on Climate Change and Hunger in Nairobi, Kenya, in October 2022.  

The two-day event was organized ahead of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27). We brought together close to 70 Christian faith leaders from Africa, Europe, and the U.S. to discuss the ways climate change is exacerbating global hunger and to sign a faith statement outlining our commitment to take action.

Strikingly, in Kenya alone, 3.5 million people need humanitarian assistance, and 360,000 Kenyans are on the verge of famine. In the nation’s largest county, Marsabit, “20 percent of the population is suffering from life-threatening hunger and malnutrition.” The Red Cross estimated in 2022 that around 755,000 Kenyan children under age 5 are acutely malnourished.

Still, there is progress being made and ample opportunity for more positive change. Smallholder farmers and others in Kenya are leveraging their resources to reduce the impact of climate change, strengthen local infrastructure, and lower national hunger rates. We can all play a role by calling on the U.S. government to assist such efforts in Kenya and other African nations through direct aid and support. 

Impact of Climate Change on Black Communities in the U.S.

Climate change is negatively impacting Black communities in the United States as well. 

According to the American Public Health Association, communities of color are more likely to experience poor living conditions. This has been attributed to historical discrimination and a lack of economic resources, and often leaves Black communities vulnerable to severe weather. 

Notably, 54 percent of Black Americans live in southern states, a region of the U.S. that is expected to see increased flooding and hurricanes due to climate change. What’s more, historical housing biases have led many African Americans to live in less desirable,  flood-prone areas​ and neighborhoods with poor access to quality, affordable food — also known as “food deserts” —  in cities throughout the U.S.  

Black Americans also tend to live in neighborhoods that are close to ​power plants​, chemical ​plants, and factories. These facilities are often unprepared or ill-equipped to deal with strong storms, and storms can result in the release of toxic pollution. For example, after Hurricane Harvey – which hit parts of Texas and Louisiana in 2017 – local petrochemical plants released cancer-causing benzene at alarmingly high rates. 

Adding to such issues is a lack of economic and political leverage that could aid in building climate resilience, or the ability to prepare and respond to extreme weather events caused by climate change. 

The unfortunate consequences of this were apparent during 2005’s Hurricane Katrina: many Black residents of New Orleans were forced to leave their homes, and more than ​half of those who perished​ in the hurricane were Black.

Research has even shown that U.S. neighborhoods historically shaped by discriminatory “redlining” housing policies tend to have “lower than average vegetation cover,” thus residents are at greater risk of being exposed to extreme heat. 

All of these factors can contribute to disruptions in quality of life, access to nutritious food, and contamination of water supplies, all of which exacerbate hunger and food insecurity in Black communities across the U.S. Yet, there is hope in today’s myriad of activists and voices who are advocating for climate justice and an end to hunger and poverty. With our collective will and advocacy, we can see progress on climate issues that impact hunger rates—not only among Black communities in the U.S. but among people around the world. 

The Need for Effective Food Systems

How can effective food systems help end hunger in Black communities?

Effective food systems are key to ensuring all people have access to enough nutritious food, especially in Black communities.  

The term “food system” typically refers to the steps and methods within the food supply chain — from the production of crops, livestock, fish, and other food commodities to the transportation, processing, preparation, and retailing of foods. It also involves the policies and cultural norms around food. 

An effective approach would be to first consider how historical inequities have left Black populations and other groups disproportionately impacted by hunger. Through this lens, we can work to establish solutions for food access that meet the needs of all.

Thankfully, there is work being done toward this objective at both the grassroots and political level. Black voices have been present alongside numerous activists, churches, and organizations in efforts to end hunger, building on a legacy of advocacy among leaders of all backgrounds. And today, our collective call for effective food systems holds the promise of ensuring a brighter, more equitable future.

A Vision for Effective Food Systems

Ideal food systems would be centered on sustainability, access, nutrition, safety, affordability, and efficiency. To realize this vision, we must urge our leaders to enact legislation and policies that move our nation and the world toward sustainable and equitable food systems. We also need continued investments in agricultural research and technological innovations that can further pave the way toward this goal. 

For instance, in the U.S., soil degradation is a serious problem often caused by widespread use of artificial fertilizers. Another big issue is increasing emissions of nitrous oxide, one of the greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. By funding research on sustainable alternatives, we can prevent further damage to fertile soil and the environment. 

Bread for the World believes that every human being is created in the image of God and has the right to proper nourishment. We have worked alongside Black farmers to transform our nation’s food systems in sustainable ways. Our organization also advocates for effective structures and policies that “affirm equality and advance equity to alleviate hunger and poverty.” 

These structures include the agriculture, activities, and resources necessary to bring food from its source to people’s tables. It is essential that systems around farming, processing, and preparing food function to protect those disproportionately impacted by hunger. As such, we’re calling for reauthorization and expansion of the Farm Bill. 

The Importance of the Farm Bill

“Farm bill” refers to legislation that impacts many parts of the U.S. food system. In fact, nearly three-fourths of the bill’s funding goes to nutrition programs, particularly the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). In 2021, SNAP helped more than 40 million Americans put food on the table.

This year, the Farm Bill is due to be reauthorized for an additional five years, and Congress has an opportunity to improve food security and agriculture across the country. 

The United Nations estimates that 2.3 billion people — over a quarter of the world’s population — are food insecure and uncertain of their next meal. Therefore agricultural research is critical to ensuring farmers have the right tools to grow nutritious food sustainably, and investment in the research title of the Farm Bill is a Bread priority.  

Bread for the World’s Advocacy

In 2022, Bread held 29 regional Farm Bill listening sessions with 730 grassroots advocates and over 100 meetings with farmers, local food system leaders, members of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and U.S. Department of Agriculture officials.

Our goal was to build and strengthen relationships and learn what they are planning to advocate for in the 2023 Farm Bill. As a result, we stand alongside our partners in seeking to:

• improve nutrition in the U.S. by increasing access to healthy food;
• foster equity by expanding access to SNAP among marginalized populations; and
• address the threats to food security posed by climate change

This Black History Month and beyond, let’s reflect on the disproportionate rates of hunger among Black populations globally and commit to being part of positive change. 

In doing so, we can all seek to learn more about effective food systems and urge our nation’s leaders to expand and reauthorize the Farm Bill, which has significant domestic and international implications. Writing and emailing members of Congress, for example, can be an impactful way to push for solutions that help address historical racial inequities. Hunger is solvable in our time. There is hope in the present and an attainable vision for a future where all people have access to nutritious food. As individuals, congregations, and organizations, we have a special opportunity to take action toward this goal.

The post How to Address Disproportionate Hunger Rates in Black Communities appeared first on Bread for the World.

One major reason for the surge in hunger is climate change. Its impacts range from drought, floods, and more severe and frequent storms such as hurricanes, to new, more destructive insect swarms and depleted soil that leads to smaller harvests of less nutritious crops. Therefore, Bread for the World continues to emphasize that effective climate action is essential to ending hunger.

The United States is a leading producer of the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, while the countries where people are suffering most from its impacts—like Madagascar and Afghanistan—have far lower emissions levels and few resources that will enable them to adapt. Bread’s climate change policy principles call for the U.S. government to contribute to the efforts of vulnerable countries to enable their people to become more resilient in the face of ongoing climate impacts.

Madagascar’s hunger emergency  puts it on the most recent list of 20 hunger hotspots  by the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). More than 2 million people are expected to need lifesaving humanitarian assistance such as food and clean water in 2023. The better news is that there has been some improvement since the first half of 2022, when tens of thousands of people in the hardest-hit areas were living in famine conditions. Humanitarian workers were able to reach the communities in greatest need in time to save many lives.

The leading causes of the hunger crisis are consecutive cycles of drought, cyclones, and other climate impacts, all of which reduce the amount of food farmers are able to grow. The other set of factors that drives acute hunger consists of high and rapidly rising food prices, caused both by lower food production and external shocks such as the global COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Perhaps what is most striking about Madagascar’s deadly hunger emergency is that the country and those who live there have very limited options for response. Madagascar is one of the poorest countries in the world. It contributes very little to global greenhouse gas emissions, and it has few extra resources to weather the economic fallout of a global pandemic of infectious disease or to strengthen its social safety net when food prices soar. Alongside the best efforts of government officials, local community leaders, and every resident who is able to contribute, Madagascar needs the support of the global community.  

The people of Afghanistan also face one of the world’s most severe hunger emergencies, according to the latest update by humanitarian agencies. Almost the entire population—97 percent of all households—struggled to meet their basic needs, including food and medical care, as of August 2022. Segments of the population are projected to face starvation in the coming months. Humanitarian officials have requested $4.4 billion to meet immediate needs.

The hunger crisis in Afghanistan has several causes that are hard to miss. They include destruction from the armed conflicts that have raged for much of the past 50 years, the impact of the withdrawal of a large portion of development assistance following the seizure of power by an extremist group, and high inflation.

Climate change causes natural disasters to be more frequent and more severe, and Afghanistan is experiencing this. One example is a June 2022 earthquake that put more than 300,000 people in need of humanitarian assistance. Another is a spike in unseasonal flash floods in several provinces in the summer of 2022. A more pervasive, slower-onset impact is continuing drought, described as “unprecedented in the last 20 years.”  Drought has damaged or destroyed crops as well as the pasture required for livestock to graze.

Whether climate change impacts are the leading cause of near-famine conditions or one among several major contributing factors, Bread will continue to press for climate solutions and additional resources to enable low-income countries to adapt to conditions that are here to stay.

Michele Learner is managing editor, Policy & Research Institute, at Bread for the World.

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Two key principles that will guide Bread’s work on the next farm bill are equity and sustainability. These values were also prominent at the first-ever gathering of the Congress of Nations and States Assembly, held in October in Belfast, Ireland. The 100 delegates came from indigenous communities all over the world. Most are members of persecuted and marginalized groups, including Uyghurs from China, Rohingyas from Burma, and Yazidis from Iraq.

Bread joined their convening, learning more about their experiences as they discussed resolutions from commissions who worked on various issue areas. Bread is particularly interested in the Environmental Commission’s resolution on Traditional Ecological Knowledge. It proposes an independent forum that would facilitate the exchange of traditional indigenous knowledge, tools, and approaches to agriculture and conservation.

The forum will encourage recognition of both traditional science and indigenous knowledge systems as effective ways of responding to climate change. About 80 percent of Earth’s biodiversity is found in areas where Indigenous communities live, and they are often the people most affected and the first to notice climate impacts. They are an indispensable part of the global response to the climate emergency.

The principle of equity is critically important in the ways non-Indigenous people interact with Indigenous communities, especially if they seek to understand more about traditional approaches to slowing climate change . Discriminatory, often violent, treatment has been the norm in far too many parts of the world, both in the past and today.

 During the Assembly in Belfast, human rights and environmental activist Abdulrahman Heidari offered a devastating example of how government or powerful private interests can refuse responsibility for the damage they cause to Indigenous land. In southwestern Iran, Ahwazi farmers generally build soil barriers in flood-prone areas that direct the water toward dried marshlands. But in 2019, the Iranian government destroyed the soil barriers, citing a risk of possible damage to oil facilities in the area. This caused more than a month of flooding in the region and displaced half a million Ahwazi people.

Another example comes from Bread’s recent work with an Indigenous Farmers’ Dialogue. Duane Chili Yazzie, a 73-year-old farmer, discussed some of the regenerative farming practices used in Shiprock Navajo Nation, New Mexico. He also described a time in 2015 when, unfortunately, the techniques that members of the Navajo Nation had developed over generations were urgently needed. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) itself spilled three million gallons of contaminated wastewater into farmland at Shiprock. Although the community received a grant from EPA to regenerate the land, the funding was only sufficient to revitalize 15 percent of the affected area, and some individual farmers are still waiting for the compensation that they had negotiated after the spill.

The Assembly offered a place for Indigenous leaders to describe such inequities and discuss potential ways of improving the situation. The overarching goal was to highlight indigenous people’s resilience and create a space where they could share their traditional and creative strategies for growing and producing food in a wide variety of environments.  

Bread is inspired by the CNS Assembly as an opportunity for Indigenous people to be represented and participate equitably in decision-making. As Christians from a place of privilege, where we have not only material resources but the ability to advocate for change with our elected officials, we are hopeful that we can work alongside some of these communities to advance their rights while also protecting the planet we must all share. It is also encouraging to see the recent interest in improving food systems among Indigenous communities in several countries. We urge their full inclusion in future food systems and climate change work.

Julie Bautista is a domestic policy analyst with Bread for the World.

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Holding COP27 in Africa drew attention to the irony that the African continent is both the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, and the least responsible for the production of greenhouse gases. At a minimum, therefore, climate justice requires supporting countries and communities, in Africa and around the world, that face disproportionate risks to human life and livelihoods. Prolonged drought, extreme heat, flooding, new pests that destroy crops, and immensely powerful storms are just a few of these risks.

Bread for the World continues to emphasize that climate change undermines food security in ways both sudden and gradual, from natural disasters to significant changes over time in weather patterns. Smallholder farmers face more hunger and malnutrition from climate change than others because most eat primarily what they can grow themselves and they rely on income from selling the remainder of their harvest to buy all other necessities. They are the backbone of their local food systems and their crops often feed their communities. One failed harvest season—let alone several years of severe drought, as East Africa has endured—can easily mean hunger and malnutrition.   

Recognizing the close links between hunger and climate change, Bread for the World hosted the Convocation on Climate and Hunger in Nairobi, Kenya, in October, where 65 leaders from the United States, the Caribbean, Europe, and Africa called for action from COP participants, whether these are governments, faith communities, the private sector, young people, or other stakeholders. The calls to action center around fulfilling previous commitments, strengthening and unifying the resolve to tackle climate change, and elevating the role of local leadership.

Faith leaders called on governments and decision-makers in higher-income countries to fulfill their countries’ promise to mobilize $100 billion annually to reduce the impacts of climate change. At the 2009 U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen, higher-income countries committed to begin making this yearly sum available to lower-income countries by 2020, but annual climate financing reached only $83.3 billion in 2020.

As earlier mentioned, lower-income countries produce far fewer greenhouse gases than industrialized economies. The climate financing was intended to support both emissions reduction and adaptation to already existing impacts. To date, most of the financing has gone to reducing emissions. Higher-income countries, including the United States, should not only keep the promise of $100 billion in financing, but should at least double funding for adaptation to climate impacts, especially for smallholder farmers and others in the agricultural system.

The Convocation participants also called on governments and decision-makers in the “Global South” to ensure that smallholder farmers have access to any available programs or resources to adapt to the changing climate around them. Financing for climate change adaptation that reaches the people most severely affected by its impacts will help preserve farmers’ livelihoods and enable them to feed their communities.

Together, the faith leaders—and Bread for the World, putting its value of “Impact” into practice—seek public policies that yield measurable results and meaningful change for those disproportionately affected by hunger and climate change. World leaders, including U.S. government officials, should use the yearly opportunity afforded by the U.N. climate change conference to make good on promises and enable communities suffering the most severe impacts to see real change.

Jordan Teague is interim director, policy analysis and coalition building, with Bread for the World.

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• The World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported in October 2022 that humanitarian actions are critical to “prevent further starvation and death” in six countries of highest concern—Afghanistan, Yemen, Nigeria,  Ethiopia, South Sudan, and Somalia.
• People in each of these six countries are either already facing starvation, or living with crisis-level food insecurity in situations likely to worsen further.
• The most recent WFP-FAO humanitarian outlook indicates that globally, about 45 million people are living in areas with high levels of severe hunger and malnutrition, levels signaling that there is a risk that conditions will worsen to the point of famine. People on the verge of famine can be found in 37 countries around the world.
• Bread has previously written about the hunger crises in Ethiopia and Nigeria. Bread also has more information on other areas where hundreds of thousands of people are living on the verge of famine. These include countries in the Sahel region just south of Africa’s Sahara Desert, Kenya, Haiti, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
• Among these 45 million people are nearly 1 million people who are projected to face famine if they do not receive additional assistance in time. These groups live in the highest-priority countries, which again are Afghanistan, Yemen, Nigeria, Ethiopia, South Sudan, and Somalia.

Causes:

• Armed conflict, notably in Ethiopia, Yemen, and South Sudan.
• Climate impacts, particularly sustained severe drought in East Africa. Somalia is projected to face an unprecedented fifth consecutive year of insufficient rainfall. 
• High food prices due to worldwide inflation and the impact of the war in Ukraine, which has significantly reduced the availability of imported grain.

Humanitarian assistance:

• High-income countries have significantly increased their investments in emergency humanitarian assistance because of the multiple hunger crises. This includes the United States, which allocated $5 billion for emergency food, nutritional support, and humanitarian assistance.
• However, the problem is that the needs are rising even more quickly than the assistance available.  According to the WFP/FAO humanitarian assessment, “Funding shortfalls and rising operational costs have reduced humanitarian assistance across many of these hunger hotspots.”
• The report continues: “Without additional funding, humanitarian assistance is likely to be further reduced across the board” between now and January 2023.  

How Bread Is Helping

Bread’s ongoing advocacy for robust humanitarian food and nutrition assistance is essential to an effective response to countries with famine or near-famine conditions. Bread for the World members are longtime faithful advocates for people in hunger emergencies and have already helped to win additional humanitarian funding this year. This is part of Bread’s efforts to persuade Congress to allocate funds that save lives, prevent irreparable harm from early childhood malnutrition, and ease suffering. Bread members also champion U.S. development assistance, which helps prevent hunger emergencies by enabling and equipping people to build resilient communities.

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As Christians from Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and North America, we share a fierce resolve to stand and work together to end the hunger crisis made worse by climate instability, to renew God’s creation, and to bring our planet into balance, forming a beloved community in which all of creation can thrive. Climate justice is our means for furthering this resolve.

The Earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. (Psalm 24:1)

We lament:

• that many of us experience hunger, loss of shelter, loss of livelihood, poor health, environmental injustice, forced migration, fear, and distress due to climate shocks;
• that healthy diets are unaffordable for almost 3.1 billion people – 40% of the world population;^[1]
• that more than 100 million people are forcibly displaced – 1 person in every 78 on Earth;^[2]
• economic systems that exploit the land and vulnerable people in mostly low-income communities for the benefit of the few;
• a planet that is wildly out of balance, with the number of weather and climate related disasters increasing fivefold over the last 50 years^[3]: supercharged hurricanes, severe drought, prolonged and intensifying waves of heat, massive floods, acidifying oceans, melting glaciers and polar ice caps, and rising seas;
• the creatures and life-systems that have been and are being decimated, and the web of life that is unraveling before our eyes.

We confess:

• that the extreme patterns of living and livelihoods of some of us cause the extreme suffering of our brothers and sisters: 10% of the world’s wealthiest individuals are responsible for around half of global greenhouse gas emissions;^[4]
• that some of us experience the impact of these extremes more than our brothers and sisters do: namely, people disproportionately affected by historic inequities that are also racialized, women and children, and those living in the Global South;
• that Christianity has too often been complicit in the exploitation of the Earth and our fellow human beings and that we have repeatedly ignored the fact that Biblical justice and righteousness are central to our identity as Christians;
• that too many Christians have ignored the findings of climate science, have failed to recognize how climate-fueled extreme weather severely harms our brothers and sisters and increases hunger, and have failed to recognize the urgency to act and address the climate emergency.

Prayer for Repentance 

O God, our Creator, turn us away from the patterns of this age that include patterns of domination, overconsumption, individualism that ignores the common good, commodification, exploitation, and othering. May we heed your wisdom and the wisdom of our ancestors, our bodies, and your whole creation. Give us strength to turn toward ways of love, trust, reconciliation, justice, and grace. Amen.

To address the hunger crisis made worse by climate change, we draw from the wellsprings of our Christian faith. We affirm the intrinsic goodness of the world that God created (Genesis 1). We recognize that the first task that God entrusted to human beings was the responsibility to care for God’s creation (Genesis 2:15). God’s love embraces not only humanity but also the rest of creation (Genesis 9:8-17). Jesus gave his life for the whole world, so that all things could be reconciled (Colossians 1:15-20; Ephesians 1:10; 2 Corinthians 2:19). The power of God’s Holy Spirit renews the face of the Earth (Psalm 104:30) and makes all things new (Revelation 21:5).

Jesus taught us to find him among “the least of these” (Matthew 25:31-46). We recognize Christ’s suffering presence in the communities hurt first and hardest by climate change: those without adequate means to flourish, the historically underserved, and those least likely to have a voice at the table where policy decisions are made – the very people who suffer disproportionately even as their contribution to global emissions is almost negligible. We also recognize Christ’s liberating, life-giving presence in the individuals and communities who refuse to settle for a killing status quo and who rise up to affirm the dignity of all people and the sacredness of Earth.

Guided by the Spirit given to us in Jesus, we regard the climate emergency as not only a socio-political and economic challenge, but fundamentally as a spiritual and moral summons to all people of faith and good will – including Christians – to participate in the growing worldwide movement to restore reverence and justice for Earth and all her communities – human and other-than-human.

Before God, we commit ourselves to share in Christ’s mission to reconcile us to God, each other, and the rest of God’s creation.

Prayer of Commitment 

Gracious God, we pray for people who benefit from – and people who suffer from – unjust systems that exploit human labor and plunder the Earth. Make us bold to stand together as Resurrection people. Empower us to step out of fear, despair, and inertia and to join – and lead – the joyful, justice-seeking, Spirit-led, unstoppable movement to make a swift and just transition to clean, renewable energy, to support vulnerable communities, and to safeguard the world that you entrusted to our care. Amen.

Call to Action

African faith leaders have invited faith leaders from high-income countries in Europe and North America to come alongside them with policies that align in establishing climate justice and ending hunger. Together, we seek public policies that yield measurable results and meaningful change for those disproportionately affected by hunger and climate change. We recognize that high-income countries have historically been the highest emitters of greenhouse gas emissions and have strategic roles to play in ending the dual hunger and climate crisis. This informs our demands for the following actions:

For All Parties at COP27

• The Adaptation Fund, and other climate justice funding mechanisms, must conform to evidence on gender and accessibility and embed Locally Led Adaptation Principles in their processes.
• Stop the politicization of climate change discourse, which is killing people around the world; accept the moral urgency of addressing the climate crisis with ambition, equity, and resolve.

For Governments and Decision Makers in the North

• Fulfill all milestone commitments made by those responsible for polluting the planet and invite the initiatives that build on these commitments.
• Fulfill the promise to mobilize $100 billion annually to fight climate change.

For Government and Decision Makers in the South

• Environmental policies, action plans and Nationally Determined Commitments should be formulated in ways that guarantee economic and ecological justice and should be fully implemented.
• Create a policy and legislative environment that enables smallholder farmers to fully utilize all available climate change adaptive measures to address food insecurity.

For the Private Sector

• Prioritize community and environmental health and sustainability in all its practices and move beyond a rigid focus on profit-making.
• The private sector must be responsible partners in addressing the climate crisis and loss and damage, and must advance practices that heal, rather than perpetuate, historic inequities.

For Young People of Faith

• The time for action is now! Young people will inherit the Earth that older generations bequeath them. We urge older generations to leave a healthy, habitable planet for those who come after.
• We celebrate youth leadership in climate activism, and we call for ecumenical unity as old and young stand together to advocate for a safe and healthy world.

For Church Leaders, Faith Communities and Faith-based Actors

• Biblical teachings, guided by church teachings, inspire, empower, and motivate us to love each other and creation with passion and to prioritize environmental action in our faith communities and our everyday lives.
• As Christians who confess and lament our past unfaithfulness and who are determined to seek climate justice for God’s whole creation, we urge all Christians and all people of faith and good will to join us in taking bold action to restore the Earth.

Signatories

^[1] The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022: https://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/2022/en/

^[2] UNHCR data in displaced populations: https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/insights/explainers/100-million-forcibly-displaced.html

^[3] WMO news report 31 August 2021, https://public.wmo.int/en/media/press-release/weather-related-disasters-increase-over-past-50-years-causing-more-damage-fewer

^[4] SEPTEMBER 2020  Stockholm Environment Institute & Oxfam The Carbon Inequality Era: An assessment of the global distribution of consumption emissions among individuals from 1990 to 2015

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In fact, it is the first time that Congress has put forth legislation linking climate change with food insecurity and agriculture.

“The Inflation Reduction Act is a historic piece of legislation that invests in creating climate-smart food systems that truly begin the process of enacting justice for those impacted by decades, indeed centuries, of discrimination,” said Sergio Mata-Cisneros, domestic policy analyst at Bread for the World. “This bill is an important first step in building, here in the U.S., the sort of food systems we wish to see also fortified around the world.”

About $20 billion of the $327 billion set aside for climate mitigation and adaption will go toward ensuring climate-smart agriculture practices. Key accounts that received significant increases in funding are the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Conservation Stewardship Program.

Both programs provide financial support to farmers – usually in the form of grants – to implement more climate-smart practices on their farms and ranches. For example, farmers can use the funds to improve irrigation techniques – avoiding wastewater while also protecting the supply of freshwater in our nation’s watersheds.

The programs have also helped farmers implement cover crop programs, which provide farmers the tools to grow grasses, grains, legumes, or other crops during off-seasons – whose roots help preserve and improve soil quality. 

Taken together, these programs have been widely successful in supporting farmers in adapting to the changing climate around them and have enjoyed strong bipartisan support for many years as part of previous Farm Bills.

The legislation also addresses the historic and racist injustices perpetrated upon farmers of color, particularly Black farmers, and communities of color over the centuries. The Inflation Reduction Act includes $3.1 billion for “distressed borrowers” whose farms might be at risk due to financial hardship.

Another $2.2 billion will go toward a program to give “financial assistance, including the cost of any financial assistance, to farmers, ranchers, or forest landowners determined to have experienced discrimination.”

Finally, the bill also includes a historic $3 billion for Environmental and Climate Justice Block Grants. These block grants will provide communities, especially minority communities who have borne the brunt of toxic pollution, the resources they need to restore their communities on their own terms, according to their own plans. 

Creating food systems that are responsive to climate change and equitable in their approach are critical components of ending hunger, both here in the U.S. and internationally. Additionally, climate justice is a critical component to rebuilding communities that have been devastated by climate crises, often further harmed by injustice and discrimination. 

Bread for the World’s goal to end hunger centers around a food systems focus: a comprehensive approach with three pillars at its center: nutrition, equity, and climate.

The Inflation Reduction Act marks, what we hope to be, a new chapter in Congress’ focus on combatting climate change and engaging in all-of-government policy that effectively ends hunger, addresses climate change, and brings about true racial justice.

Daren Caughron is an international policy analyst at Bread for the World.

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“I am Black and beautiful … the sun hath looked upon me ….” Song of Solomon 1:5a & 6a (New Revised Standard Version)

In approximately 1010 B.C.E., Solomon became the tenth son of King David (the second king of ancient, united Israel) and the second son of Bathsheba. Scholars of Blacks in the Bible trace her genealogy through her grandfather Ahithophel, David’s African counselor (II Samuel 11:3) and argue that Solomon was Black.

At the same time, scholars’ debate if Song of Solomon 1:5a & 6a is referring to Solomon or his bride. Still others query whether the reference is meant to be a mockery of being Black or a celebration of it, depending on the translation.

While these debates are quite important to debunking untruths or misunderstandings about Blackness and African heritage in the Bible, the lessons of leadership from persons like Solomon are also significant as we celebrate Black August 2022.

Like King Saul and King David, King Solomon reigned for 40 years in one of the highest and most prosperous periods in Israel’s history. Some scholars call it the “Golden Age” of Israel. Solomon’s leadership is credited for his ability to be wise, compassionate, people-oriented, diplomatic, creative, and innovative.

Black August provides an opportunity to remember and foster ancient and contemporary leadership like this. Black August is a season for uplifting the legacy of these gifts by and for people of Africa and of African Descent.

Black August also includes the celebration of these gifts on the International Day of People of African Descent. This year this day is complemented by the official launch of the Permanent Forum of People of African descent in December. This will happen after the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, more commonly referred to as COP27, which will be held from 6-18 November 2022 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. This will be a timely moment when we consider climate change as a major cause of hunger and acknowledgement that Africa is dramatically and disproportionately affected by climate change.

People of Africa and of African Descent will have a key role in the leadership and participation at COP 27, as they have in the past. They will bring proposals of successful practices of adaptive strategies to climate. This includes the wise and results driven practice of agroecology. Agroecology is an approach that focuses on ecological farm management using low-cost, low-input methods that rely on a diversity of crops to improve soils and diets. Governments in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Senegal are working alongside farmer organizations to promote agroecology, including the subsidization of biofertilizers and other natural inputs as alternatives to synthetic fertilizers.

Bread for the World is and will be listening for more proposals like these as we seek to deepen our relationships with African faith leaders and European partners and learn from wise and innovative methods like these to advance our advocacy agenda together. Learn more at www.bread.org.

Angelique Walker-Smith is senior associate for Pan African and Orthodox Church engagement at Bread for the World

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Bread for the World believes that every human being is created in the image of God, and thus, has the right to enough nutritious food for good health. We therefore advocate to elected officials to establish effective systems, structures, and policies that affirm equality and advance equity to alleviate hunger and poverty.

Among these structures and systems, a sustainable and equitable food system is essential to provide access to enough nutritious food. Such food systems include activities and resources necessary to bringing food from its source—farms, ranches, oceans—to people’s forks.

Because billions of people work in various parts of U.S. and global food systems, such as farming, processing food, and cooking, it is essential for these systems to function effectively to protect people and practice good stewardship of our planet.

The weaknesses of our current global food system are laid bare by the high and rising numbers of people living with hunger. Yet we know there is hope. Farmers are working to produce enough food under difficult conditions, parents are working to serve their children nutritious meals, and researchers are working to find new ways of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to climate change. Bread for the World supports the following principles essential to equitable and sustainable food systems:

Nutrition
Food systems should prioritize sufficient supplies of nutritious food for all. Nourishing people should be the primary function of a food system. Actions to support nutritious food for all include:

• Doing more to prevent malnutrition, a leading cause of death among children under 5, particularly those in the critical “1,000 days” nutrition window between pregnancy and a child’s second birthday.
• Strengthening incentives and support for farmers to grow healthy, nutrient-dense foods in greater quantities.
• Ensuring historically excluded groups have access to vital safety net nutrition programs.

Equity
The global community should move food systems toward equitable outcomes for all people. All societies have structures and systems that discriminate against people because of their race, gender, religion, ethnicity, or other identity traits, and food systems are no different. Current food systems often produce unequal impacts for historically marginalized communities related to hunger, malnutrition, and poverty. Equitable policies will:

• Create more opportunities for socially disadvantaged farmers in the United States by increasing access to resources such as credit and government extension services.
• Ensure equitable access to U.S. foreign assistance programs and resources for groups that have historically been excluded yet are critical to ensure food security and nutrition, such as women smallholder farmers, national
  and local civil society organizations, and research institutions in lower-income regions.
• Ensure fair wages, hours, and working conditions to enable workers in all sectors of the global food system to earn a decent living while their right to dignity is upheld.

Climate
Food systems must make rapid progress toward environmental sustainability by taking the necessary actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural activities already seen. Sustainable food systems meet people’s needs today without undermining the food security of future generations.
A food system strategy that is smart on climate will:

• Support research, development, and implementation of techniques to reduce emissions in the food system and to support communities to adapt to the impacts of climate change and build resilience.
• Reduce food waste and food loss to reduce emissions. Among many ways of accomplishing this are creating better ways of collecting and distributing surplus food in the United States and improving access to storage
  facilities that prevent food spoilage in lower-income countries.

We urge our nation’s leaders to enact policies and make investments that embody these key principles to improve the U.S. and global food systems and end hunger and malnutrition.

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The following statement can be attributed to Rev. Eugene Cho, president and CEO of Bread for the World:

“Bread for the World was encouraged by President Biden’s remarks during the COP26 climate summit and the unveiling of the President’s Emergency Plan for Adaptation and Resilience (PREPARE). PREPARE would be the United States’ largest-ever investment in climate adaptation for lower-income countries that are vulnerable to climate change.

“Bread recognizes that climate change is a hunger issue and is fueling rapid increases in the numbers of people facing severe hunger. Climate change disproportionately impacts people who have been historically marginalized. It causes droughts, floods, and unpredictable weather patterns which make it difficult for farmers to grow their crops. PREPARE would help farmers and communities adapt to climate change and significantly reduce hunger worldwide.

“We must live out God’s will for humanity in Genesis 1:26-28 to care for creation. Bread urges The White House and Congress to work together to pass legislation to achieve the important goals in PREPARE and looks forward to the upcoming USAID climate strategy.”

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Climate change affects everyone, but some populations are disproportionately impacted. In the United States, those groups include Black, Indigenous, and Other People of Color (BIPOC). Systemic racism both past and present means that members of these communities are more likely to live with poverty and hunger.

Bread for the World recently published our newest series of one-pager resources on the intersections of hunger, racial equity, and climate change in the United States. The three pieces look at the specific impacts of climate change in African American, Indigenous, and Latino/a communities.

In order to slow climate change and respond to its current and projected impacts, the United States must use a climate justice approach. This means simply that all plans for mitigation and adaptation, as well as their implementation, need to take into account the systemic inequities that have led to our country’s current divisions based on race, ethnicity, gender, and other ingrained biases. As noted, such injustices make some people far more likely than others to be affected by climate change, and as a group, these people have contributed far less to the problem than other Americans. Climate justice is person-centered, responding to the unique needs of those in the most immediately and most severely impacted communities. Its principles should be an integral part of any initiative from its beginnings.

African Americans, Indigenous people, and Latino/as also have higher rates of food insecurity than white households. Bread’s analysis identifies four main ways that climate change exacerbates hunger in BIPOC communities: (1) the racial wealth divide; (2) housing segregation, racialized concentrated poverty, and disinvestment in neighborhoods; (3) racial health inequities; and (4) lack of sovereignty, meaning that communities do not have the agency needed to make independent decisions in the best interests of their people.

The one-pagers include four recommendations to strengthen efforts to keep climate change from increasing hunger in BIPOC communities. These focus on ensuring that BIPOC communities have the resources and space they need to make decisions that protect their people from both hunger and damage caused by climate change.

To develop a climate justice framework that centers racial equity:

• Honor the expertise and leadership of BIPOC communities in the planning, implementation, and evaluation phases of all climate response efforts.
• Center the leadership of BIPOC communities in developing strategies to reduce racialized concentrated poverty, racial health inequities, and racial wealth divides.
• Equitably increase investments in BIPOC-led initiatives to strengthen infrastructure that is at risk of severe damage or destruction as climate change disasters become more frequent and more severe.
• Walk in solidarity with BIPOC communities as they exercise their sovereignty to make decisions to prepare for and respond to climate change.

See Bread’s one-pagers on African American, Indigenous, and Latino/a communities to learn more about the intersections of hunger, racial inequity, and climate change.

Karyn Bigelow is a research analyst with Bread for the World Institute.​

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This is the final installment of a five-part series on hunger in fragile contexts and how development assistance can enable people to improve their food security.

The road ahead will undoubtedly be hard, but there are ways that the United States and the rest of the global community can help people in fragile contexts as they seek to build a future without hunger, malnutrition, or a global pandemic.

The cases in this series show that fragile contexts can be found specifically in the Middle East, Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa, but more universally anywhere in the world. This is because the primary cause of fragility is conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and weak government capacity also contribute. No human society is immune from such factors.

Bread for the World Institute described fragility and its main causes in our 2017 Hunger Report, Fragile Contexts, Resilient Communities. Drawing from our previous work, articles and research by international aid agencies, such as Concern Worldwide, IFPRI, and the World Bank, and interviews with subject matter experts, we offer the following key recommendations for a COVID-19 recovery plan in fragile contexts. The emphasis is on making assistance more effective in ending hunger.

• Recognize and invest in local capacities for resilience and governance

Any anti-hunger or other development effort, but especially those in fragile areas, must be planned and carried out in context-specific ways. As outside humanitarian workers have learned over the years, a one-size-fits-all approach does not work in different countries nor, quite often, in different regions of the same country. In addition, the effects of this drought may not be like those of the one 10 years ago, even in the same place.

Foreign assistance must focus on strengthening resilience in local populations to future disasters (natural and manmade) and recognizing and strengthening their local capacities to deal with them effectively and efficiently. More than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic that has led to national lockdowns, closed international borders, and decimated international travel, the importance of building resiliency and funding local capacity could not be more apparent.

The concept of “country-owned” development is not new, but in fragile contexts, perhaps especially where there is armed conflict, the process of shifting power to local communities and leaders may not have been completed or even begun. In these situations, donors can use the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to redefine their relationships with local partners. It’s important to ensure that they are equipped to take ownership of programs and resources, and also that they have any support requested to hold their governments accountable for the basic services they should be providing their populations.

• Prioritize ensuring that policies work together, not against each other

All policies and actions—whether in the realm of economic development, humanitarian assistance, trade, security assistance, or diplomacy—must work together, rather than against each other or at cross-purposes. Otherwise, efforts to improve food security and nutrition in sustainable ways cannot succeed.  Two brief examples help illustrate why this is so.

Providing food without considering the potential harm to smallholder farmers of flooding the market is likely to hinder the efforts of rural communities to adapt their agricultural practices to be more climate-resilient—and thus to avoid the next food emergency. Rebuilding schools and homes without pressing the fighters who destroyed them to declare a ceasefire and then enter genuine negotiations runs the risk of seeing the same families displaced, the same children unable to continue their education, the next year and possibly the year after that.

Donors also need to think through whether decisions about humanitarian assistance and international development in fragile contexts are coherent. One potentially difficult question is whether to withhold foreign assistance to press a government to meet a donor country’s policy priorities. Donors need to find the right balance between pressuring recipient countries on important issues—such as human rights violations—and maintaining assistance so as not to make the population worse off and in even greater need of assistance.

Aid effectiveness in fragile contexts requires a clear understanding of the many effects of policies, whether obvious or subtle and especially in humanitarian and development areas, and a willingness to adjust accordingly.

• Incorporate a climate-conscious lens

As we pointed out earlier in the series—for example, in the piece on countries in the Sahel in sub-Saharan Africa— climate change is a major contributor to fragility in many contexts. Climate change can be a “last straw” where deep poverty, armed conflict, poor government performance, and other factors have already created a fragile country or region. Therefore, many of the countries most affected by fragility are also those facing the brunt of the climate crisis.

All development aid and humanitarian assistance to climate-affected nations must be seen through a “climate lens” to ensure that it does not make matters worse, but instead works to mitigate the impacts of the crisis. Agencies must be mindful of how food systems are rebuilt in a post-COVID-19 world. Local food systems need more investment, especially from a climate-sensitive lens. Farmers need support to use agroecological and climate-smart agricultural techniques to adapt to the changing climate.

The other side of the coin is that in addition to supporting adaptation by countries that are most affected, the United States should take all measures necessary to limit its own climate impacts. Among the many reasons to do so is the contribution of greenhouse gas emissions to growing hunger and food insecurity.

The main lesson learned from this project is that there is no silver bullet to design and implement effective aid in fragile contexts, but that traditional donor/recipient relationships and siloed approaches have not worked in the past, and they will not work in the post-COVID-19 world.

It is time to reset the direction of the route the world is taking in its efforts to end hunger, especially in fragile contexts. It is time for a collaborative approach, from the grassroots up, to address the myriad causes of fragility. It is time to shift resources and power definitively into the hands of the people whose lives are affected. It is time to aspire to and implement a U.S. foreign policy that is more than “do no harm”—a strategy that seeks the highest good attainable for all.

Jordan Teague is interim co-director, policy analysis and coalition building, and Rahma Sohail was 2020 Crook fellow with Bread for the World Institute.

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“Bread for the World welcomes President Biden’s pledge to significantly reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. As one of the largest producers of greenhouse gasses, the United States must take a leadership role in bringing these emissions under control, including through climate-smart agriculture.

“Climate change is a primary driver of hunger globally. It causes droughts, floods, and unpredictable weather patterns which make it difficult for farmers in developing countries to grow their crops. Climate change is also contributing to the crises in Central America and elsewhere that are driving people from their homes.

“Bread was pleased the administration acknowledges historically disadvantaged communities in the U.S. have been hit hardest by climate change, and that it is committed to prioritizing investments in these communities. We encourage the administration to do more to ensure equitable outcomes by engaging historically disadvantaged communities in all phases of planning, implementing, and evaluation of climate adaptation and mitigation strategies.

“While we affirm and commend the significant progress that could be achieved in this proposed plan, we recommend incorporating the use of agriculture and forestry to reduce emissions and capture carbon.  We further urge the administration to create and increase opportunities for land access among Native American, Black, and other farmers of color as well as opportunities to partner in developing climate-smart agriculture solutions.”

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Climate, Hunger, and Racial Equity

While climate change impacts everyone, regardless of race, policies and practices around climate have historically discriminated against and excluded people of color. Due to structural racism, communities of color bear the negative impacts at a higher rate. Addressing climate change through a climate justice approach ensures that climate change is addressed in a racially equitable way that centers the voices and leadership of people of color.

Although this is often not acknowledged, Latino/as have a long Indigenous lineage in the Americas, with societies established centuries before the land was invaded by Spanish and English colonizers and long before the United States was formally established. Today, there are more than 59 million Latino/as living in what is now the United States. Some were born in the U.S. while others migrated from what is now Mexico, Central America, or South America.

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Climate, Hunger, and Racial Equity

While climate change impacts everyone, regardless of race, policies and practices around climate have historically discriminated against and excluded people of color. Due to structural racism, communities of color bear the negative impacts at a higher rate. Addressing climate change through a climate justice approach ensures that climate change is addressed in a racially equitable way that centers the voices and leadership of people of color.

Indigenous people have experienced more than 500 years of structural racism, including colonization, forced displacement, and discriminatory policies that undermine tribal sovereignty. This has created residential segregation and one of the largest racial income and wealth divides in the U.S. These conditions inform the way Indigenous communities are able to respond to and prepare for climate change—leaving many susceptible to losing their livelihoods and experiencing hunger for the first time or experiencing deeper levels of hunger. 

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Climate, Hunger, and Racial Equity

While climate change impacts everyone, regardless of race, policies and practices around climate have historically discriminated against and excluded people of color. Due to structural racism, communities of color bear the negative impacts at higher rates. Addressing climate change through a climate justice approach ensures that climate change is addressed in a racially equitable way that centers the voices and leadership of people of color.

African Americans have experienced more than 400 years of anti-Black structural racism, including U.S. chattel slavery and subsequent racist or discriminatory policies. These policies helped create the largest racial income and wealth divide in the U.S., which has limited the ability of African Americans to respond to and prepare for climate change. Natural disasters of increasing severity and frequency have left many African Americans susceptible to facing hunger.

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Earth Day, April 22, is quickly approaching. Read on for a look at some of the main activities, many virtual and all centered around this year’s theme, Restore Our Earth.

We have also recently published a feature on continuing advocacy on the Child Tax Credit expansion, the most significant opportunity to reduce U.S. child poverty in many years; a look at the daunting problems Venezuela faces, despite its status as an oil-rich, previously middle-income nation; and an update on efforts to contain the COVID-19 pandemic in the only way possible—through worldwide vaccination.

Ahead of Earth Day itself, on the evening of April 20, the Hip Hop Caucus and its partners will host the “We Shall Breathe” virtual summit. This digital event will “examine climate and environmental justice, connecting the climate crisis to issues of pollution, poverty, police brutality, and the pandemic, all within a racial justice framework.”

Organizers of this year’s Earth Day, the 51st annual, have identified five pillars that will contribute to realizing the goal of restoration of the Earth. They are the Great Global Cleanup, Food and the Environment, the Canopy Project, Climate Literacy, and the Great Global Challenge.

Of the five pillars, Bread for the World Institute is, of course, primarily focused on Food and the Environment, but we also work on other pillars, particularly Climate Literacy. Bread staff work to enable policymakers, anti-hunger advocates, climate advocates, and others who are interested to see why and how hunger is inextricably connected with climate change. In fact, as we describe in our 2017 Hunger Report, Fragile Environments, Resilient Communities, climate change is one of the main causes of global hunger. 

The first-ever Earth Day was held in 1970. Climate change was not on the radar among people in the United States. Nevertheless, the first annual Earth Day is credited with inspiring the modern environmental movement, and it focused on key environmental concerns that are even more pressing today than 51 years ago. The Great Global Cleanup is always much needed.

The Canopy Project produces and shares training events and educational materials on why and how communities may plan to plant and—equally important—provide life-sustaining care for new trees. It joins a host of impressive grassroots reforestation initiatives. Among the best-known is Kenya’s Greenbelt Movement.

The Great Global Challenge pillar is centered around science, including a citizen science initiative. People all over the country are invited to participate in research on important environmental and climate concerns. Two current topics are air quality and plastics. Another key focus is bees, as we continue to hear alarming news about the collapse of bee colonies—and ultimately, of course, people’s ability to grow food since bees are essential pollinators.

Because I live in Maryland, I have been encouraged to download and use an app to help track cicadas. Maryland will be the epicenter when, in mid-May, the billions of cicadas of Brood X, all of which have lived underground for the past 17 years, emerge to seek mates. Researchers are gathering reams of cicada data from “citizen scientists” and others to learn more about how climate change is affecting insect species.

Returning now from climate science to Bread’s central concerns, I’d like to mention a few other hunger and food systems initiatives of the network that organizes Earth Day. A 2020 report, Climate Change and the American Diet, offers insights into U.S. public attitudes toward eating more climate-friendly, plant-based foods. Written through a partnership between Earth Day Network and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, the report finds that people are fairly receptive to the concept but don’t have much information.

About half (51 percent) of those surveyed said they would eat more plant-based foods if they had more information about the environmental impacts of their food choices. But nearly two-thirds reported that they had never been asked to eat more plant-based foods, and more than half said they rarely or never hear about the topic in the media.

Just a sampling of other Earth Day Network initiatives: The Foodprints project measures the various environmental impacts of the “farm to fork” system in the United States. The 2012 Urban Environment Report evaluated 72 U.S. cities on more than 200 environmental indicators, centered around residents who “may have greater sensitivity or susceptibility to environmental, health, and social problems.” Farmers for Earth is a free information-sharing platform for small and medium-sized farmers in the United States. Launched on Earth Day 2019, it offers opportunities for farmers to connect with peers who are already engaged in sustainable agriculture as well as with subject experts.

Bread for the World Institute wishes everyone a Happy Earth Day and, since restoring the Earth is not a one-day project, a fulfilling Earth Year as well.

Michele Learner is managing editor with Bread for the World Institute.

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“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” Matthew 5:6

Unlike the Ten Commandments, which dictate what we should not do, the Beatitudes advise us about what we should do to be in the right relationship with each other. Jesus’ teachings help us to understand the benefit of being righteous by encouraging us to be agents of justice, mercy, and love—not only toward humanity, but to all of creation.

Mathew 5:6 teaches us that it is not enough for us to invite and profess righteousness; we must make actual investments through our actions to demonstrate our commitment to righteousness. In this scripture, the words hunger and thirst remind us of the urgency of addressing the physical weakness that accompanies lack food or water. These same words emphasize the urgency of craving for righteousness, which leads to sustainable spiritual life.

Climate justice is based on a biblical principle of righteousness. It is a movement led by communities that have been disproportionately affected by unjust environmental policies and practices, communities that have been left to hunger and thirst—not only for nutritious food and water, but also for equity and dignity. The environmental justice movement recognizes the humanity and creation of all people.

People from Africa and the African diaspora—In the United States and globally—live with the historic realities of colonialism and structural racism. These systems have directly magnified environmental injustices. And yet, Pan African communities are leading climate justice movements. Bread for the World embraces these and related justice efforts. One of our principles states that communities of color should be engaged in risk reduction planning, guided by their self-determination.

During the second quarter of this year, climate change is a focused educational advocacy issue for Bread for the World. To this end, we are partnering with coalitions like Ecumenical Advocacy Days (EAD). We affirm the 2021 EAD conference statement that says that systemic and historic issues have “manifested themselves in the disproportionate number of racial and ethnic minorities who became sick with and died of COVID-19, as well as the continued extrajudicial killing of Black men and women.”

The Bread for the World website offers you opportunities to learn more about environmental justice and to join our effort. You can sign Bread for the World’s Care for Creation pledge or download Bread for the World’s 2017 Hunger Report, Fragile Environments, Resilient Communities, in which we explain how climate change is an obstacle to ending hunger and extreme poverty.

You are also invited to meet with us virtually by registering for the EAD conference on climate justice. In addition, you can check out my related message at a recent United Nations working group session on Environmental Justice, the Climate Crisis and People of African Descent.

Angelique Walker-Smith is senior associate for Pan African and Orthodox Church Engagement at Bread for the World.

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“Bread for the World welcomes the executive order signed by President Biden recommitting the United States to the Paris climate agreement. Climate change is a primary driver of hunger globally, and the world will not be able to end hunger unless we bring climate change under control.

“By 2030, there may be an additional 100 million people living in extreme poverty as a direct result of climate change. Children in climate-affected areas are more vulnerable than adults to the impacts of droughts and floods, such as hunger and malnutrition when crops are destroyed, and the spread of vector-borne diseases such as dengue and malaria as a result of extreme heat.

“The U.S. is one of the largest emitters of the greenhouse gasses which cause climate change and must act to reverse the impact. As the administration and Congress begin the difficult work of restoring an economy broken by the COVID-19 pandemic, we urge them to take a comprehensive approach that includes creating green jobs that reduce inequality and transforming our food system to deliver better nutrition and slow climate change.”

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By Karyn Bigelow

The world has cut hunger in half over the past 30 years—an unprecedented pace of progress toward solving an age-old human problem. Making further progress on hunger is more complicated and difficult now than it was a generation ago because climate change is quickly altering the planet we know. Ironically, how climate change affects people is a topic often missing from the climate change conversation.

Adapting to the impact of climate change on agriculture and food will be vital to humanity’s survival. Advances in agriculture and technology have enabled farmers to produce enough food to keep up with population growth, which is critical since the global population is expected to reach 10 billion by 2050. Feeding 10 billion people will require producing more food than the world produces now, when the global population is about 7.8 billion. Climate change will make this task harder, because climate change brings shifting weather patterns that make weather more unpredictable and extreme events such as hurricanes more intense.

It is clear that improving agricultural productivity is essential. But by itself, it is not enough to end hunger. Hunger in a world that produces enough food for all is a matter of equity. An essential ingredient in the successful effort to cut hunger in half was a strong political commitment to greater equity—a commitment demonstrated by giving more attention and allocating more resources to people in marginalized communities, which have the highest hunger rates.

Climate change is poised to reverse the progress made in the past 30 years. By 2030, there may be an additional 100 million people in extreme poverty as a direct result of climate change. This means that ending hunger will not be possible without significant progress on slowing climate change.

The year 2021 is a critical time to make the changes needed to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which drive climate change. Climate experts have determined that it is essential for the world to achieve net zero emissions by 2050 to prevent global warming of more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, a scenario that would carry catastrophic consequences.

There are policies that can help reduce the human costs of two major challenges we face today, climate change and COVID-19. These fall into two main areas. The first is ensuring food availability and utilization by better preparing farmers and the land to adapt to the impacts of climate change—a group of actions we can sum up as climate-smart agriculture. The second is ensuring food accessibility and stability by establishing well-functioning systems of social protection that save lives and create livelihoods, even in difficult circumstances.

“Sometimes people say climate change threatens the planet. Actually the planet itself will survive. What is at stake is humanity’s ability to live on this planet.”

—Kumi Naidoo, South African environmental activist

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This story is part of the July 2020 issue of Institute Insights

It is hard being Black in America right now. This is not new, but rather a reminder of the trauma threaded throughout the African American experience in the United States. While I’m following the advice of experts to remain home and keep social distance, it is frightening and devastating to see people who look like me dying from COVID-19 and police brutality at alarming rates. For many of us, it feels like a gut punch to see headlines and social media posts about the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and countless others.

Although COVID-19 and police brutality may seem unrelated, what connects them is structural racism, which plays a large part in the lived experiences of African Americans, from what our neighborhoods are like and what we eat, to the air we breathe and every other aspect of life.

Hearing George Floyd say, “I can’t breathe” was not the first time I heard those words. I have heard those words throughout my life.

As a Black child growing up in Washington, DC, I heard “I can’t breathe” frequently as a student in predominately Black public schools. Many of my classmates were asthmatic or had respiratory problems that required them to carry rescue inhalers or do breathing treatments. I recall moments in the fifth grade, sitting at my desk in Ms. Brown’s class, when out of nowhere, a classmate would raise her hand and ask to go to her locker to retrieve her inhaler, because suddenly she couldn’t breathe. Other times, a classmate in gym class would be gasping as he sat on the bleachers, waiting for his inhaler to help him catch his breath and saying, “I can’t breathe.” Asthma attacks were so frequent amongst my classmates that I thought asthma was as common as having seasonal allergies.

In general, African Americans are more likely to live in areas with high levels of smog, also called ozone pollution, which can cause breathing problems, increased risk of respiratory infections, and cardiovascular effects. The same respiratory illnesses put many African Americans at high risk of dying of COVID-19 if they contract the virus.

The people most likely to experience respiratory problems are the same people as those most likely to live with hunger and poverty in neighborhoods of concentrated poverty. Poor African Americans are five times more likely to live in areas of concentrated poverty, which have 20 percent, 40 percent, or even more of their residents living below the poverty line, as poor white Americans.

Unless our country confronts and dismantles systemic racism, Black people and other people of color will continue to be the first and worst-affected by climate change and environmental crises. We must approach the work of climate change and hunger using an equity lens that measures not only the outcomes, but also changes in the root causes of racial inequities.

Karyn Bigelow is research associate with Bread for the World Institute.

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Younger generations have the most to lose if today’s leaders in government do not act more assertively to slow climate change.

This is the basis for an inspired climate advocacy campaign that is currently in progress, centered on a lawsuit filed against the U.S. government in federal court. The plaintiffs, 21 children and young people ranging in age from 10 to 22, allege that the government has knowingly violated their rights by failing to respond to climate change more forcefully and effectively.

Bill McKibben, pioneering climate activist and founder of the international environmental organization 350.org, describes the plaintiffs’ day in court as “the most important lawsuit on the planet right now.”

The case began on October 29, 2018, in the U.S. District Court in Eugene, Oregon. The plaintiffs want the federal government to implement a national Climate Recovery Plan consistent with the best available scientific analysis. The plan would prioritize reducing greenhouse gas emissions, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2). Bill McKibben’s organization is named after the number considered the maximum safe level of CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere, 350 parts per million. The level today is 408 parts per million.

Nobel Laureate and economist Joseph Stiglitz will appear as an expert witness. He has been providing pro bono analytical support, which includes a 50-page expert’s report that argues that the U.S. government, through “insufficient action on climate change, [is] imposing and will continue to impose enormous costs on youth plaintiffs.”

The United Church of Christ (UCC) Council for Climate Justice is calling on the faith community to publicly support the children and youth who are bringing the case to court. Kiran Oommen, one of the plaintiffs, is the son of ordained UCC minister Melanie Oommen, and UCC was the first denomination to call for financial divestment from fossil fuels.  In addition to providing financial support for the legal team, the UCC is encouraging young leaders to show their solidarity with the 21 children and youth by delivering sermons on climate justice.

Our Children’s Trust, an environmental organization, is providing legal support to the plaintiffs. It has been supporting cases brought by youth in state courts since 2011 and describes its mission as “elevat[ing] the voice of youth—to secure the legal right to a healthy atmosphere and stable climate on behalf of all present and future generations.”

The federal lawsuit, Juliana v. United States, was filed in 2015, but the federal government has fought at every stage to block the case from coming to trial, and it continues to petition for it to be dismissed. The case has drawn national media attention, which has given several of the plaintiffs a platform to speak out. “You don’t have to call yourself an activist to act,” said lead plaintiff Kelsey Juliana in an interview with Bill Moyers on Moyers & Company. “I think that’s so important that people my age really get [that] into their heads. As a younger person, I have everything to gain from taking action and everything to lose from not … It’s important that youth are the ones who are standing up because of the fact that we do have so much to lose.”

Julia Olson, chief legal counsel for the plaintiffs, believes that whatever decision is reached by the District Court is likely to be appealed to the Supreme Court. The U.S. government is virtually certain to file an appeal if it loses the case or key elements of it. You can follow the latest news about the case at Our Children’s Trust.

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God of grace and God of mercy, 
Our hearts break as we watch stories on the news,
Of dangerous flood, of lost lives, and rains that won’t stop. 
Of trembling earth that destroys homes and takes lives.
We trust that you are present in the desperation and hopelessness that abounds.
Transform our broken hearts so that we might be agents of your love in the coming days and months.
God in your mercy, hear our prayer.
Amen.

Millions throughout the Caribbean and the southern United States have been and continue to be affected by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Jose, and Maria. Many lives continue to be at risk. At the same time, earthquakes in Guanajuato and Mexico City have left hundreds dead and more missing. Many of our partner denominations and organizations are responding to these disasters. They are bringing hope to our neighbors, particularly to the most vulnerable people.

Some are working through national agencies, while others are working diligently with local churches and organizations. We have highlighted several of our partners’ national efforts below. To help victims of the two earthquakes in Mexico we refer you to the Cruz Roja Mexicana, the Red Cross of Mexico.

We are proud to partner with these denominations and organizations in our work to end hunger.

• African Methodist Episcopal Church has provided recovery links
• Adventist Development and Relief
• Baptist World Alliance
• Catholic Relief Services and for Mexico relief
• Catholic Charities USA 
• Convoy of Hope (National Association of Evangelicals)
• Cooperative Baptist Fellowship
• Episcopal Relief & Development
• Evangelical Covenant Church
• Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
• International Pentecostal Holiness Church has a disaster response agency
• National Baptist Convention USA, Inc.
• Nazarene Compassionate Ministry
• Presbyterian Disaster Assistance
• Salvation Army
• Saint Vincent de Paul Disaster Services
• United Methodist Committee on Relief for Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria
• Wesleyan Church and World Hope International are partnering in response to the recent hurricanes
• World Renew
• World Vision

Rev. Nancy Neal is interim director of church relations at Bread for the World.

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I remember Rome like it was yesterday.

Last fall, in 2016, I had the pleasure of visiting Rome on pilgrimage and to soak in the majesty of the eternal city. As a first-time pilgrim, I marveled at the 17th century regal fountains of St. Peter’s Square, among other masterpieces. These memories remain very fresh in my mind.

That is why a news item of July 25, 2017, immediately caught my attention: The Vatican turned off all of its 100 fountains, including two Baroque masterpieces in St. Peter’s Square and interior fountains in the Vatican Gardens. The objective? To save water due to an ongoing prolonged drought. Did you know that the city of Rome is experiencing one of its worst droughts in decades? The drought is said to have affected almost two-thirds of Italy’s farmland as well as its capital, Rome.

It makes perfect sense to me.

Rome is not alone. Today, the effects of severe droughts are a shared experience of millions of children, women, and men. This year, droughts have brought millions to the verge of starvation. Drought is part of a wider-scale event sweeping across swathes of the Horn of Africa region, for example. In Somalia, the effects of three consecutive failed rainy seasons, coupled with the cumulative impact of more than 20 years of civil conflict, have meant severe water and pasture shortages in pastoral regions, decimated livestock, and reduced milk production. A people’s livelihood destroyed. Today, more than 6 million people in Somalia — half the population — need urgent humanitarian assistance. The most vulnerable populations in the most affected areas are living at a higher risk of starvation than others.

Looked at one way, we are at a crisis moment that should force us all to act. That is why, in my recent testimony before Congress, I emphasized that climate change is not a myth, that it threatens to undo the steady progress we have made against global hunger and extreme poverty. I have seen firsthand the devastating effects of climate change on communities that are already struggling with hunger. It is undercutting the gains we have made in development over the past decades.

Recently, I asked a mother of four in northern Kenya about her thoughts on climate change. She said, “It is destroying the dreams of my young family. I want to abandon this farm. It no longer produces enough to nourish my family … yet I have nowhere to go.”

Prolonged drought not only reduces the ability of households to feed themselves, but also erodes assets. The loss of valuable animals such as cattle makes it difficult for families to recover. It is still more difficult to be prepared for future droughts, floods, and other extreme weather events that have become more frequent due to climate change. Millions of people all over the world, particularly children, are suffering from these effects today.

To make matters even worse, current severe droughts are triggering disease epidemics such as cholera. In many of the areas affected by famine — in Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia, and northeastern Nigeria — inadequate quantities and quality of water because of drought, the inaccessibility of safe water sources due to ongoing conflict, and high water prices beyond the reach of many, has forced people to drink unsafe water. As a result, devastating outbreaks of cholera, a deadly water-borne disease, could kill thousands of people in all four countries.

The Vatican is doing its part to conserve water, which is a shared resource for all of us, no matter where we live. The dry fountains in Rome are telling us a bigger story.

The scientific evidence points to more frequent and prolonged droughts, both now and in the future. Pope Francis’s encyclical, Laudato Si, released in June 2015, makes a strong moral argument for why all peoples must confront climate change. It makes a clear connection between changing global weather patterns and hunger. By shutting down the city-state’s 100 fountains, Pope Francis is again sending a message to all of us, especially world leaders, to pay close attention to the plight of the 20 million people on the brink of starvation — and to act. Large-scale, coordinated humanitarian assistance is critical to save millions of lives, especially those of children under 5, who are more vulnerable to death from malnutrition than older children and adults.

Faustine Wabwire is senior foreign assistance policy advisor in Bread for the World Institute.

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“Climate change is already a significant cause of hunger around the world,” said Asma Lateef, director of Bread for the World Institute. “Because of droughts, floods, and unpredictable weather patterns, farmers in developing countries are no longer able to grow food in places they have been farming for generations. Many are having to leave their communities in search of food or income elsewhere.”

The U.S. is the world’s second-largest emitter of greenhouse gasses, which cause climate change. If the U.S. reneges on its commitments, global temperatures are likely to rise much faster than they would have otherwise.  The impact of climate change includes crop failures and the loss of grazing lands, soil degradation, the spread of mosquito-borne disease, and the destruction of fisheries. Climate change is a factor in today’s famine and near famine conditions in four countries in Africa and the Middle East.

People already living in hunger and poverty have been the hardest hit by climate change. However, changing weather patterns are also affecting people in developed countries, including the U.S. If left unchecked, coastal cities like New York, New Orleans, and Miami could be submerged under water.  

“The countries that contributed the most to climate change have a responsibility to help vulnerable people adapt to changed conditions,” Lateef said. “The U.S. must live up to its commitments—it’s the right thing to do. It is also in our national interest.”

Bread for the World Institute recently released a video, “Too Wet, Too Dry, Too Hungry,” that draws the clear connection between climate change and hunger. It features Bill McKibben, environmentalist and founder of 350.org. The video anchors a new series based on the award-winning 2017 Hunger Report: Fragile Environments, Resilient Communities.

“The world will not be able to end hunger without addressing climate change,” Lateef added. “Unfortunately, President Trump’s actions today have made it that much more difficult to reach this goal.”

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“Many Americans do not think of climate change as a cause of hunger,” said Asma Lateef, director of Bread for the World Institute. “Yet changing climate patterns are resulting in droughts, floods, and other extreme weather events across the globe. People are no longer able to grow food in places they have been farming for generations. Climate change is a contributing factor to the strife and famine we are witnessing today.”   

To make matters worse, it’s the people who were already poor and marginalized who are now being hardest hit by the effects of climate change. If left unabated, climate change will continue to increase hunger and poverty around the world. Climate change not only affects people in Somalia and other countries suffering hunger crises, but also environmental conditions in the United States.

“Climate change is a sort of amplifier of all the weaknesses and fractures within our world already. It makes it much, much harder to cope with what are already very difficult problems,” said Bill McKibben, environmentalist and founder of 350.org in a new video released today. “The most fundamental human needs, food, water, are now at risk in a way that they’ve never been at risk before.”

The Hunger Reports video, “Too Wet, Too Dry, Too Hungry,” debuts in time for the celebration of Earth Day and the National March for Science, both on April 22, and the People’s Climate Movement March on April 29. The video anchors a new series based on the award-winning Hunger Report 2017: Fragile Environments, Resilient Communities, published by Bread for the World Institute.

“Progress in recent decades shows that ending hunger is possible within our lifetimes,” Lateef added. “However, the world will not be able to end hunger without addressing the causes of climate change. And we must help people become more resilient to the damage already caused by changing climate patterns.”

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It is not unusual for a woman farmer like Cubar to lead such a group in the Philippines. Eight out of every 10 smallholder farmers worldwide are women, and the Philippines is no exception. However, limited fertile land, irrigation, and now climate change have conspired against farmers working to provide rice to the country’s 97 million people.

Climate change is the issue that most worries Cubar and other smallholder farmers. The resulting unpredictability of weather patterns has wreaked havoc on the ability of smallholder farmers to reliably feed people. They are unsure about what kind of rice to plant and when to do so. But now, through the federation, Cubar is teaching fellow smallholder farmers to adapt to climate change.

The Philippines, an archipelago of 7,100 islands strung along the Pacific Ring of Fire, is ranked among the top 10 countries worldwide at risk from climate change and natural disasters. This island chain has one of the highest exposures to climate change risks like typhoons, floods, landslides, and droughts.

Typhoons cost the Philippines as much as $1.6 billion annually. Among the most impacted are smallholder farmers, predominantly women, who grow most of the rice that feeds Filipinos. Fortunately, many Asian countries like the Philippines have launched programs to help smallholder farmers adapt to rapidly changing weather patterns.

One of those programs is the Philippines Climate Change Adaptation Project (PhilCCAP), made possible through an agreement between the Philippine government and the World Bank. The United States is the World Bank’s largest shareholder, which means the U.S. gives a substantial amount of money to the World Bank for development projects that help many people, especially those struggling with hunger and poverty.

How much money the federal government invests in the World Bank impacts the success of its projects and also how many people living with hunger and poverty can benefit.

One of the hallmarks of the PhilCCAP program is that it teaches weather forecasting to smallholder farmers. This is vital, given the volatility of climate change.

Rapidly changing weather patterns have reduced farm yields in the Philippines. In the past decade, strong typhoons have wiped out entire rice harvests, and extended droughts have withered them. Harvest losses mire smallholder farmers in debt since many small farmers borrow money to buy seeds and fertilizer.

“When you owe a financier, they take what they want from the farm,” Cubar says. “It’s quite disgusting — working, working, and working for nothing. We saw that if we embrace the project, we will never lose.”

Diversification of products and integrated farming is key to a smallholder farmer’s survival. As an early adopter of the practice, Cubar now helps other farmers to do the same. She encourages them to branch out beyond rice. She says she knows that hard times may be ahead. 

“So I tell them to integrate,” she says. “If you don’t have money, you sell your chickens. You still need more money? You can sell your pigs. We are trying to change our farming system, not to stick to rice alone.”

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By Derek Schwabe

The world has made incredible progress against hunger and poverty over the past few decades, but climate change has started to unravel it.  

Since 1990, more people have escaped poverty worldwide than during any other period in human history. The global poverty rate in 2015 was less than half of its 1990 rate. But as the 2017 Hunger Report warns, maintaining this progress means that governments — particularly the governments of the major emissions-producing countries — must reduce carbon emissions and curb rising surface temperatures. At least 100 million people will be pushed back into poverty by 2030 unless the world makes and follows through on commitments bold enough to change the current climate change trajectory.

More frequent and severe flooding, heat waves, droughts, and other extreme weather events will continue to upend food systems and rob whole populations of their homes and livelihoods. Temperature increases are altering global weather patterns, resulting in drastic reductions in crop yields. If climate change worsens while the human population increases, food shortages will be almost inevitable. Conflicts over scarce resources, particularly in fragile states, could escalate to full-scale wars.

Because of the potential for climate change to destabilize countries in some of the most volatile regions of the world, the U.S. military considers it a threat to national security.

It’s never easy to get all the countries of the world to act decisively together — even when global peace and security hang in the balance. That’s why the Paris Climate Agreement of 2016 is such a stunning achievement — it is truly global, and it urges immediate action. In fact, 197 countries made firm commitments to make “nationally determined contributions.” These commitments do not yet add up to enough to keep the planet’s temperature increase under 2 degrees C., which climate scientists agree is the maximum possible increase before catastrophic consequences such as the surge in poverty and displacement of millions become inevitable. However, the agreement also requires countries to periodically reevaluate and strengthen their efforts. This promise to go beyond the original commitment is a second reason why the Paris agreement is the world’s best hope.

The agreement way well also be our last hope. As far as the planet’s health is concerned, it was reached in the 11th hour — almost too late to prevent wide scale calamity, no matter what actions countries take in the future. Humans have been contributing to climate change for more than a century, with most emissions produced by rich industrialized countries. The Paris agreement is likely our last chance to avoid the most devastating effects of human actions on the planet.

U.S. leadership is integral to the agreement’s success, particularly because it has added more greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere than any other country. However, the incoming Trump administration has alarmed observers by giving ample reason to doubt that it will even recognize the existence of climate change, let alone take the swift, decisive actions needed. Even beyond its moral indefensibility in light of the human costs, the president’s “America first” mentality is extremely short-sighted, prioritizing immediate profit over preventing the incalculable economic costs the United States will incur in a world destabilized by climate change. And these bills will be presented, not to grandchildren or some other future generation, but to this generation.

Our elected leaders cannot secure a more stable and prosperous United States and fulfill U.S. responsibilities to the rest of the world without taking action to reduce carbon emissions. Honoring the Paris Agreement is the best way to start.

Read more about the contribution of climate change to hunger and malnutrition in the 2017 Hunger Report: Fragile Environments, Resilient Communities.

Derek Schwabe is a research associate at Bread for the World Institute.

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The beginning and the end dates of Time for Creation are linked with the concern for creation in the Eastern and the Western traditions of Christianity, respectively.

September 1 was proclaimed as a day of prayer for the environment by the late Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios I in 1989. The Orthodox church year starts that day with a commemoration of how God created the world. On October 4, Roman Catholics and other churches from the Western traditions commemorate Francis of Assisi, known to many as the author of the Canticle of the Creatures. Many American Protestant churches in recent years have started to commemorate St. Francis Day in October with a blessing of pets during worship services.

God’s creation – the Earth, our home – is very closely tied with the issue of hunger because it is the source of our food, the very thing that keeps us alive daily.

The proposal to celebrate a Time for Creation during these five weeks was made by the Third European Ecumenical Assembly in Sibiu, Romania in 2007. The following year, the World Council of Churches Central Committee invited churches to observe Time for Creation through prayers and actions. In 2015, Pope Francis has designated September 1 as a World Day of Prayer for Care of Creation for the worldwide Roman Catholic Church as well. Many of the denominations involved with Bread are also members of the World Council of Churches.

The council has many liturgical resources available to help churches mark Time for Creation.

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African-American church members are addressing what Pope Francis and others see as a major threat to humans: climate change.

The African Methodist Episcopal Church, one of the country’s largest and oldest African-American denominations, held its general (national) conference in Philadelphia earlier this month. The conference passed a resolution on climate change.

“We can move away from the dirty fuels that make us sick and shift toward safe, clean energy like wind and solar that help make every breath our neighbors and families take a healthy one,” states the resolution, which also points to research showing that black children are four times as likely as white children to die from asthma.

The reasoning given is simple: African-Americans are disproportionally harmed by global warming and fossil fuel pollution based on where they live.

“The voices of communities whose inhabitants look like us often are dismissed or disregarded,” the resolution says. “But the world cannot afford to silence us, and we cannot afford to be – and will not be – silent. Climate change most directly impacts the poor and marginalized, but ultimately, everyone is in jeopardy.”

Jacquelyn Dupont-Walker, director of the denomination’s social action commission, stated that her church’s election mobilization group will work until the election to question the candidates on climate change. Dupont-Walker’s goal is to “hold elected officials accountable.”

According to research done by the NAACP:

• Heat-related deaths among African-Americans occur at a 150 to 200 percent greater rate than for whites.
• 71 percent of African-Americans live in counties in violation of federal air pollution standards, compared to 58 percent of the white population.
• 78 percent of African-Americans live within 30 miles of a coal-fired power plant, compared to 56 percent of whites. They are also more likely to live adjacent to a landfill or incinerator.

The denomination is a partner of Bread, and some of its 7,000 congregations and 2.5 million members across the United States participate in Bread’s advocacy to end hunger.

Bread believes that climate change and hunger are connected, saying that the world will not be able to end hunger without confronting climate change and its threat to people who are hungry and marginalized.

Andrew Philip Frey is an intern in Bread’s communications department.

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The link between climate change and hunger in developing countries is clear to most people. For example, a shorter rainy season can severely affect how much food a small-scale farmer in Tanzania can grow to feed her family throughout the year. Here at home, however, the link may not be as clear. The connection is often through the loss of homes, jobs, and livelihoods. Last month, I saw an example of this firsthand while attending the Green Faith Emerging Leaders Convergence in New Orleans, La.

The week-long conference brought together 60 faith leaders from the U.S. and Canada who are engaged in climate justice work.

New Orleans is the epitome of a North American city struggling with climate change. We heard from survivors of Hurricane Katrina. It was a powerful week, but one day stuck out the most to me.

We toured the Isle de Jean Charles, a bayou community an hour and a half outside New Orleans. We met our tour guides, David Gauthé and Coy Verdin, the night before the visit. They spoke for less than 10 minutes, but the gravity of their words was not lost on me. I began to realize that my feet were about to walk on land that may not be around in 10 years or even less than that.

The state of Louisiana lies below sea level, and the southeastern region is flooding. Since 1955, 90 percent of the land mass of Isle de Jean Charles has disappeared. Every 38 minutes this area of the state loses a football field worth of land. Once tall trees are now barely poking out of the water.

Isle de Jean Charles is set to become the first community in the nation to be relocated due to the effects of climate change. In January, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development allocated $48 million for the resettlement.

With each tropical storm, there is a risk of infrastructure being wiped out by floods. Public services, such as the police department and the elementary school, have already been relocated out of Isle de Jean Charles. One long road with only two lanes connects people in the community to markets, stores, and other needed services. The road has been rebuilt multiple times due to flooding from tropical storms, each time repairs costing the federal government $3 million.

This is a community of hard-working people, many of whom are fishermen and whose families have lived here for generations. They are trying to cope with the growing challenges climate change brings. As a community, they have come to together to make sure that they can prolong their ability to live in Isle de Jean Charles as long as possible.

We should care about the challenges facing the people of Isle de Jean Charles. Not only does climate change jeopardize their food security and safety, but residents are emblematic of many other communities in the U.S. and abroad already affected or expected to be affected by climate change.

Without reforms, climate change will wipe out the progress the world has made in eliminating poverty and ending hunger. Crops and land necessary for the livelihoods of smallholder farmers abroad will cease to exist, and closer to home rising waters will engulf more and more communities, shattering lives and pulling vulnerable people deeper into poverty.

Coy Verdin, one of our tour guides, is a fourth-generation commercial fisherman. Fishing is in his family’s blood and how his family has made its living. However, he does not want to teach his children how to fish.

He said he does not think the family profession can continue. The sea has been their support in the past, but now it is destroying their future.

Karyn Bigelow is the government relations coordinator at Bread for the World.

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The SDGs are an opportunity for advocates and organizations to work together to achieve maximum impact. Many are already engaged. For example, leaders of all major U.S. faith traditions, as well as five U.S. cities and one state (California), have committed to the SDGs.

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“This historic agreement will put us on a path to reducing greenhouse emissions and helping the most vulnerable communities adapt to the effects of climate change,” said Asma Lateef, director of Bread for the World Institute. “We appreciate the leadership the United States, and President Obama in particular, have shown in making this agreement a reality. It has taken a lot to get to this point, but now that we are here, it is time to move forward and deal with this urgent problem.” 

Climate change is already wreaking havoc on countries across the world, including the U.S., where it is responsible for droughts, flooding, and severe weather events such as Superstorm Sandy. According to the White House, climate and weather disasters cost the American economy more than $100 billion in 2012 alone. If left unabated, climate change will increase hunger and poverty both in the U.S. and throughout the world.

Bread for the World Institute’s background paper, “Hunger and Climate Change: What’s the Connection?” highlights the effects of climate change on people who are poor and marginalized. Bread for the World believes the world will not be able to end hunger and extreme poverty by 2030 without confronting this global challenge.

In addition, Pope Francis’ much-heralded encyclical, Laudato Si, or “Praised Be,” underscores the collective moral responsibility of the Catholic Church and all peoples to address climate change. It draws a clear link between changing global weather patterns and hunger.

“Just a few years ago, many thought that reaching an accord like this would be impossible,” said Faustine Wabwire, senior foreign assistance policy analyst at Bread for the World Institute. “But here we are, with almost every nation agreeing to cut their carbon emissions. It is truly a historic moment for our country and the planet.” 

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“Los patrones climáticos en flujo ya están causando sequías, inundaciones, y eventos climáticos extremos por todo el mundo. Las personas, las comunidades, y los países pobres se verán especialmente afectados por los efectos del cambio climático. El cambio climático también tendrá un impacto devastador en la seguridad alimentaria global”, dijo Asma Lateef, directora del Instituto Pan para el Mundo. “A pesar de que los Estados Unidos y otros países han hecho algunos esfuerzos para combatir el calentamiento global, queda claro que se tiene que hacer mucho más para poder evitar la crisis inminente”.

Algunos miembros del Congreso de los Estados Unidos ya han anunciado que intentarán prevenir la asistencia que ha prometido el Presidente Obama a naciones pobres para combatir el cambio climático, si al Senado no se le permite votar sobre cualquier acuerdo hecho en París. La Conferencia sobre el Clima de París es la culminación de varios años de negociaciones para intentar formar un nuevo acuerdo internacional sobre el cambio climático.

El ensayo del Instituto Pan para el Mundo, “El Hambre y El Cambio Climático: ¿Cuál es el Vínculo?”, destaca los efectos del cambio climático en la personas pobres y marginadas. Pan para el Mundo afirma que será imposible acabar con el hambre y la pobreza extrema para el año 2030, una meta introducida en los Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible, sin enfrentar el cambio climático.

Además, la encíclica del Papa Francisco, Laudato Si (Alabado Seas), enfatiza la responsabilidad moral colectiva de la Iglesia Católica y de todos para abordar el cambio climático. Demuestra un fuerte vínculo entre los patrones climáticos globales en flujo y el hambre.

“El cambio climático amenaza con rápidamente anular el progreso global que hemos logrado contra el hambre y la pobreza extrema”, dijo Faustine Wabwire, analista superior de asistencia extranjera del Instituto Pan para el Mundo. “La mayoría de los afectados ya son pobres y marginados, y se ven más afectados a medida de que el cambio climático acelera. No podremos acabar con el hambre y la pobreza sin que nuestros líderes tomen acción decisiva ahora”. 

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“Changing climate patterns are already causing droughts, floods, and extreme weather events across the globe. People, communities, and countries that are poor will be hardest hit by the effects of climate change. Climate change will also have a devastating impact on global food security,” said Asma Lateef, director of the Bread for the World Institute. “While the United States and others have taken some steps to address global warming, clearly much more needs to be done if we are to prevent the looming crisis.”

Some members of Congress have already announced they will try to block funding President Obama has promised to help poor nations fight climate change unless the Senate is allowed to vote on any agreement made in Paris. The Paris Climate Conference is the culmination of years of negotiations to try to forge a new international agreement on climate change.

Bread for the World Institute’s background paper, “Hunger and Climate Change: What’s the Connection?” highlights the effects of climate change on people who are poor and marginalized. Bread for the World believes the global community will not be able to end hunger and extreme poverty by 2030, goals recently agreed upon in the Sustainable Development Goals, without confronting climate change.

In addition, Pope Francis’ much-heralded encyclical, Laudato Si, or “Praised Be,” underscores the collective moral responsibility of the Catholic Church and all peoples to address climate change. It draws a clear link between changing global weather patterns and hunger.

“Climate change threatens to quickly undo the steady global progress we have made against hunger and extreme poverty,” said Faustine Wabwire, senior foreign assistance policy analyst at Bread for the World Institute. “Most of those affected are already poor and marginalized and become more impacted as climate change speeds up. We will not be able to end hunger and poverty unless our leaders take decisive action now.”   

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I just concluded a visit to Kenya, where I visited smallholder farmers, businesses, and agro-pastoralists. One of the places I visited, Marigat, is a settlement in the lowlands of Baringo County. It was in Marigat that I met Rose, a 97-year-old great-grandma. During our visit, she wanted to know if it was indeed true that President Obama had promised that there would be an end to hunger soon. She had heard that he had made this commitment during his visit to Nairobi a few days earlier.

It was a refreshing experience — partly because I got to listen and learn from the real-life experiences of people whose lives are impacted by the policies I work on — agriculture, food security and nutrition, trade, and climate change, among others.

Marigat is generally very dry. Residents depend on subsistence farming — they cultivate tomatoes, watermelon, onions. Because the dry conditions limits their crop options, they also rear small livestock — chicken, sheep, and goats. Bee keeping is a crucial livelihood strategy as well. In fact, Marigat residents were quick to tell me that they produce the best honey in the country, but they struggle to market it.

Rose is part of a 10-member women’s group that works together to earn a living. Each morning, they walk for approximately 10 miles to an area where they pick up stones and break them down — by hand — to marram. Later, they sell the marram.

But why does this group of elderly women work at something so strenuous? Aren’t there other, more manageable ways to generate some income?  

Rose explained to me that previously, she would join other members of her community to cultivate crops. She also raised livestock. She flourished. But with time, those efforts have been consistently frustrated by insufficient rainfall and increasingly prolonged drought cycles. Rose says that over the years, hunger and malnutrition have increased in her village, and she believes that the harsh, unpredictable weather patterns that have caused crop and livestock failure have a lot to do with it. Excessively high temperatures have reduced plant cover and left the soil bare, meaning that it erodes easily and ends up deposited in neighboring Lake Baringo.

The lake, which in past years provided fish as well as water for cultivating crops, is also under threat. Its water levels have dramatically declined — in fact, it is becoming a seasonal lake — and it is more saline, so fish stocks are declining. Efforts by the Kenyan government to save the lake and mitigate the impact of climate change on this community need additional support.

Great-grandma Rose is among millions of poor people around the world whose efforts to feed themselves are frustrated by the threat of a changing climate. Prolonged droughts not only reduce the ability of households to feed themselves — they also erode assets, such as cattle, making it difficult to recover and even more difficult to be prepared for future droughts.

Reduced crop production also causes food prices to rise, increasing the risk of hunger and malnutrition. 

As President Obama and the global community prepare to launch the world’s new Sustainable Development Goals at the United Nations General Assembly next week (September 25-27), Rose hopes that commitments to end hunger and extreme poverty truly “leave no-one behind.” Leaders should prioritize strengthening community resilience through “multiple-benefit” approaches that can both improve agricultural production and reduce climate risks:

• Strengthen the capacities of local institutions to adopt agro-ecological farming models in a changing environment.
• Identify and promote crop varieties that are heat, drought, and salt-tolerant, including wild varieties with high nutritional value.
• Fund national agricultural systems to strengthen and increase expertise in agricultural research as well as advisory and extension services on climate risk management and adaptation.
• Support rural agricultural infrastructure, including roads and storage to prevent post-harvest losses. 

“Don’t get tired of pushing our own government and President Obama to help us fight climate change… We can grow our own food and nourish our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren if climate change stops. Enda na Mungu — Swahili for ‘Go with God.'” — Great-grandma Rose

Faustine Wabwire is the senior foreign assistance policy analyst at Bread for the World Institute

Photo: Ms. Wabwire, Grandma Rose, and other community members in Marigat. Bread for the World Institute.

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In June, Pope Francis delivered his impactful encyclical on climate change. “The Earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth,” Francis wrote, blaming consumerism, overconsumption, and dependence on fossil fuels on the growing environmental problem.

To continue with his mission, Pope Francis announced a World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation on September 1.

Climate change “represents one of the principal challenges facing humanity in our day,” the pope wrote. “Its worst impact will probably be felt by developing countries in coming decades.”

This is a collective opportunity for the Christian body to take action. God has entrusted humankind to act as stewards of this planet. Psalm 115:16 says, “The highest heavens belong to the Lord, but the earth he has given to mankind.”

God has given this earth to us, and as the Earth’s caretakers we are to protect the land, animals, and vegetation for the common good of all. The Bible is clear that it’s our responsibility to care for the Earth the way God would care for it. This means that we are to use the earth but not abuse it.

Let’s continue being good stewards through prayer, advocacy, and conservation. Join World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation  on September 1.

Shalom Khokhar is a summer intern in the communications department at Bread for the World.

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“Pope Francis has laid out a convincing moral argument about why we must confront climate change. Especially how it impacts the poor and most vulnerable among us,” said Rev. David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World. “Climate change is increasing hunger throughout the world. It is the poorest who continue to suffer the most. Now is the time to come together and act on this global threat.”

Pope Francis has been outspoken regarding the effects of climate change on the poor. He has chastised world leaders for failing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Millions of people throughout the developing world are already feeling the effects of climate change. This makes it even harder for them to grow and secure food.

Earlier this month, the Bread for the World Institute released “Hunger and Climate Change: What’s the Connection?” It highlights the effects of climate change on the poor and marginalized. Bread for the World believes the global community will not be able to end hunger and extreme poverty without confronting climate change.

“The world can no longer ignore the fact that climate change is devastating communities across the globe,” said Faustine Wabwire, senior foreign assistance policy analyst at the Bread for the World Institute. “Most of those affected are already poor and marginalized. They become more impacted as climate change speeds up. We will not be able to end hunger and poverty until our leaders take decisive action.”

Bread for the World will gather more than 100 faith leaders in Washington, D.C., on the eve of Pope Francis’ visit to the United States in September. They will welcome the pope and reflect on his teachings about hunger and poverty.

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“It will be impossible to end hunger and extreme poverty without addressing the causes and impacts of climate change,” said Asma Lateef, director of Bread for the World Institute. “Climate change has already had a devastating effect on people’s lives, and the situation will only get worse. We need a global solution now.

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, changing climate patterns are projected to dramatically undermine food security. The poorest people will continue to suffer the most, especially those living in developing countries or who are subsistence farmers. They will need help in adapting to conditions that were difficult before climate change, and are now becoming much worse.

Later this month, Pope Francis will deliver his first major papal encyclical. It will address climate change. The final draft of the encyclical specifically discusses the effects of climate change on the world’s poorest people and the need for the Roman Catholic Church and the leaders of other religions to come together and help them “prepare for the challenges of unavoidable climate and eco-system changes.”

Women are especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change, but they also possess valuable knowledge. Women grow more than half of all the food in developing countries, and up to 80 percent in parts of Africa—mostly for their family’s consumption. Extra efforts must be made to provide women with resources to adapt to climate change, as they are often overlooked by male agricultural extension agents.

Bread for the World has joined with the World Bank and leaders of 30 faith groups and organizations in calling for an end to hunger and extreme poverty by 2030. Research conducted by Bread for the World shows that ending hunger and extreme poverty is possible in 15 years. However, climate change may quickly undo any progress that is made.

“There is still time to prevent worst-case scenarios, but it will require the global community coming together to confront and mitigate the impacts of climate change,” added Lateef. “We urge our leaders to equip those who are most affected to adapt to this global crisis and implement strong measures that focus on the root causes of climate change.”

The release of Bread for the World’s analysis coincides with World Environment Day, which takes place on June 5.

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Goyoden is a small, rural town on the coast of one of the islands in the Philippines. Growing one’s own food is a necessity in a rural community such as Goyoden.

But that has become increasingly difficult. Shifting weather patterns have begun to disrupt the usual growing season cycle.

The first time I visited Goyoden was as part of an undergraduate student immersion experience. Each of us stayed with a local family for a few days in an attempt to understand the Goyoden way of life. My classmate and I stayed with Nanay (informal word for mother) Nory.

Nanay Nory makes a living working in shellcraft and selling her products in markets on the mainland. Her husband is a tailor who works from home. They generate enough income between them to buy seafood from local fishermen as well as staple foods from the mainland. They occasionally cook with edible plants that they grow behind their house.

Nanay Nory is also part of a group of women involved in small-scale agriculture – planting crops in a common garden near her house.

Whenever she spoke to us about the garden, she would talk about how it had become more difficult to tend to the garden over time; she also mentioned that there were certain months in the year when they could not fish, plant, or both—which would put stress on their food supply.  

When we asked her why it was hard to keep planting, she answered simply, “Mas mainit ngayon e.” Well, it is hotter these days.

For the Goyoden people, the stability of the seasons is essential for both their livelihood and nutritional needs.  But they’ve come to realize that the  seasons are changing; the dry season is getting drier—too dry to plant for some months—and the wet season is more erratic and unpredictable. There is no local term for climate change, but the community understands that the seasons are changing and keep adjusting, hoping for the better.

Goyoden is one community among many grappling with food insecurity as a result of climate change. Climate change is an issue with implications on the ground, most of all, and it is communities like Goyoden—the ones contributing the least to the problem—that are most in danger of suffering the consequences.

In the future, farmers may be hard-pressed to continue planting for profit, and fishermen dread the day their nets come up empty.

Averill A. Amor is a communication intern at Bread for the World.  

Photo: One of the Nanays (mothers) tending to her garden in Goyoden. Averill A. Amor/Bread for the World.

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“We are hopeful that the bill will generate strong bipartisan support, as did its counterpart in the House, by building off of the effective Feed the Future initiative,” said Eric Mitchell director of government relations at Bread for the World. “This piece of legislation, if passed, will have significant impacts on the lives of the more than 805 million chronically undernourished people in our world, including in regions like sub-Saharan Africa, where one in four people are affected by food shortages.”

S.1252 would authorize and improve Feed the Future, the critical U.S. government program for global food and nutrition security. In 2014, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced that world hunger had dropped by over 100 million in the previous decade. This was due in part to programs like Feed the Future helping millions of small farmers in developing countries increase the amount of food they grew.

Up to 50 percent of the agricultural labor force is women in many developing countries, yet they tend to produce less food than men because they are less likely to own land, and women face higher barriers to hiring labor, accessing credit, and utilizing training and extension services. Programs like Feed the Future help to narrow this gap.

“This legislation’s efforts to address maternal and child nutrition will help the U.S. achieve its goal to end preventable child deaths, almost half of which are caused by malnutrition,” said Mitchell. “It would also further bolster U.S. leadership by leveraging a whole-of-government approach to tackling global hunger, poverty, and malnutrition.”

Efforts are currently underway to garner additional cosponsors of the Senate legislation. The House counterpart of the Global Food Security Act, H.R. 1567, unanimously passed out of the House Foreign Affairs Committee last month and awaits further consideration by the full House of Representatives.

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The report stresses the mutual benefits of economic growth and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Today, no country’s future is secure unless all countries reduce dependence on fossil fuels and increase use of clean energy. Economic growth and reducing greenhouse gas emissions not only can occur simultaneously, they can reinforce each other, in much the same way that green jobs in the United States can provide productive employment and promote energy efficiency and economic growth. 

The bottom line for gauging the success of the economic recovery is whether there is a significant reduction in the number of hungry and poor people in the United States and around the world. This report is intended to challenge all of us to think creatively and constructively about how economic recovery, climate change, and poverty can be addressed together — for the benefit of us all.

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Developing nations face many barriers to achieving the MDGs, some unique and country-specific, others broadly shared. Common problems faced by fragile nations can be grouped into four areas: poor starting conditions; weak governance and institutions; conflict and instability; and environmental degradation.

To meet the MDGs and create a sustainable path to development, countries must adopt policies and programs to overcome these problems. Developed countries have a role to play in overcoming these barriers. Aid donors, particularly the United States, must ensure that development assistance is flexible enough to help countries address these challenges and meet the MDGs.

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