New UN campaign seeks to combat hunger among millions of schoolchildren by World Food Programme (WFP) 5:20am 19th Feb, 2008   Feb 2008    The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) today unveiled a new global fundraising and awareness campaign to benefit the nearly 60 million children around the world who go to school hungry.    Health and education interventions are less effective when given to people who lack basic nourishment, the agency noted.    The new initiative – “Fill the Cup” – aims, literally, to fill a cup with food for hungry schoolchildren, increasing their chances for health, education and a better future.    According to WFP, it will take about $3 billion per year to feed all 59 million children who go to school hungry worldwide, while $1.2 billion can provide meals for the 23 million children in 45 of the neediest African countries. Just $0.25 can give one child one cup of porridge, rice or beans and provide girls with a monthly ration to take home.    “The need is great, but so is the ability to help – a single Euro (or $1.50) feeds a school child for a week,” said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran, adding that feeding children in school helps promote not only education, but also healthy and strong communities. “We are often asked by people, young and old how they can help,” Sheeran said. “This is how.”    WFP is a major provider of school meals in developing countries. From Afghanistan to Somalia, some 20 million children benefit from WFP school meals at the cost of only $0.25 a day.    Partnering with WFP in the campaign is FIFA World Player of the Year, Kaka, who is also the agency’s Ambassador against Hunger. “I come from a country where I’ve seen first-hand how hunger can rob a child’s potential,” said Kaka, a native of Brazil. “So I’m very proud to call on soccer fans and others to help Fill the Cup and lay a foundation for our future.”    Also participating in the campaign are the President of Ghana, and head of the African Union, John Agyekum Kufuor, and the Mayor of Milan, Letizia Moratti.    President John Agyekum Kufuor said school feeding has helped Ghana to stay on track to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, the first of which is to halve hunger and poverty by 2015. “Every nation’s future rests on food and education,” said Kufuor.    WFP has calculated that just 25 cents (US$) can give one child one cup of porridge, rice or beans and provide girls with a monthly ration to take home.    “A child dies of hunger every six seconds. WHO has declared hunger and malnutrition the number-one threat to public health,” said Josette Sheeran, Executive Director of the World Food Programme.    “The need is great, but so is the ability to help – a single Euro (or $1.50) feeds a school child for a week,” said Sheeran, adding that feeding children in school helps promote not only education, but also healthy and strong communities.    “We are often asked by people, young and old - school children, truck drivers, dentists and teachers – how they can help,” Sheeran said. “This is how.”    WFP is partnering with the city of Milan. Milan Mayor Letizia Moratti said: “Through its candidacy for Expo 2015, Milan and Italy have made available to the international community their energy, competence, and knowledge to tackle together the huge challenges of our time to create a truly sustainable future.    " The theme ‘Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life’ represents the spirit in which we collaborate, concretely, with the Millennium Campaign and with all the programmes of the UN, and other multilateral organizations which are active in reducing hunger, drought, and poverty in the world. Today we are pleased to work alongside the World Food Programme as a new, important ‘travelling companion’ on this road of international solidarity.”    WFP – the world’s largest humanitarian agency – will feed more than 70 million people this year in some 80 countries around the world. Visit the related web page
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