Recently, Secretary of State Clinton unveiled the Administration’s new global food security strategy, which promotes the role of agriculture advancement in developing countries, and represents a shift from historic emergency food assistance focus. In the past, America has sent millions of tons of wheat, corn and other commodities to help starving children in the developing world. Under the new proposal, in addition to supplying emergency food aid, the U.S. will also lead in efforts to help developing nations better feed their own people. American-led “know how” and investments in agriculture, through research, technology, infrastructure improvements, and education, will yield long-term, sustainable solutions and ultimately, in the Secretary’s words, “[address] the underlying causes of hunger.”

Earlier this year, the United Nations World Food Program revealed that more than 1 billion people in the world are hungry. This recent increase in the number of hungry people worldwide reverses a 30-year downward trend that saw success against hunger here and abroad. Now, every six seconds a child in the developing world dies from hunger. This devastation causes untold suffering and must end. Now is the time for our country to take the lead and make the necessary investments to ensure that no child dies from hunger. Feed The Children strongly supports this initiative and will continue our work to see that these investments are made.

In the shadow of the Capitol Building, a national symbol of liberty, justice, and equality, more than 25% of children live in poverty. Although these statistics are startling, the most recently available data is from 2008, so it doesn’t fully account for the impact of the current economic recession. That means that things are worse—and getting worse every day.

Ed Lazere, Executive Director of the DC Fiscal Policy Institute told the New York Times, “It’s been a familiar but depressing story of the only people benefiting in the city’s economy are those with the most education.”

Therefore, one of the keys to ending the cycle of hunger and poverty is education. That’s why Feed The Children is responding by partnering with the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth (NAEHCY) to provide the District of Columbia Public Schools with needed backpacks, books, and food through our Homeless Education and Literacy Program (HELP). HELP’s goal is to ensure that students have the tools they need to do well in school. Therefore, by sending trucks filled with school supplies to children in DC, we’re feeding not just their minds, but their futures—and contributing to the end of hunger in our nation’s capital.

Friday, October 16 marked World Food Day, a global recognition of the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. It concludes the World Food Prize Symposium, held in Des Moines, Iowa this year, when the World Food Prize is awarded.

This year’s distinguished recipient, Dr. Gebisa Ejeta, a professor of agronomy at Purdue University, said that the current food shortage is a “ticking time bomb.” Skyrocketing food and fuel prices in 2008 ultimately resulted in food riots in dozens of countries worldwide. “That was a wake-up call to lots of people and lots of governments,” Dr. Ejeta continued, “not so much because of the hunger concern, I’m afraid to say, but because of fear of political instability.”

World Food Day 2009’s theme, “Achieving food security in times of crisis,” certainly underscores the fact that these are trying times. In fact, they are times like no other in history. More than 1 billion people—a sixth of the world’s population—are hungry. Drought, political strife, and the current economic crisis have further compounded and complicated undernutrition and malnutrition. Thankfully, we can make progress.

In his World Food Day address, FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf said, “Generally, programs, projects and plans exist and are simply waiting for the political will and resources to become operational.” In other words, the time to act is now.