EDITORIALS
Ease childhood hunger
Improvements in food stamp program and other efforts could boost nutrition
President-elect Barack Obama has a full agenda of economic and international policy concerns, but he must also focus attention on rising hunger in the United States. About 691,000 children went hungry sometime last year. That is a national disgrace.
The Agriculture Department presented an alarming report charting those hungry children, and highlighting the fact that close to one in eight Americans struggles for adequate food. To make matters worse, that was before the economic downturn.
As groceries and gas prices rose, so did the number of empty stomachs. Overall, 36.2 million adults and children struggled with hunger last year, which was a slight increase from 35.5 million in 2006. The problem boils down to a lack of money or assistance to get enough food, and especially to get enough nutritious food. Little, including learning, gets done on an empty stomach. Educational initiatives, vital to breaking the cycle of poverty, are harder to implement with a classroom of hungry children.
Obama pledged to expand food aid in an effort to alleviate childhood hunger by 2015, an ambitious goal. Any new initiative needs to be launched immediately, as suggested by the Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group.
The group recently called for a boost in food stamp benefits. The food stamp program is a strong one, but inadequate to provide a healthy diet for a month. As a person’s income increases, he or she receives fewer benefits. The average is $3 to $4 in food stamps a day per person. Even at the maximum, the benefit is just not enough. Particularly in big cities, it costs 25 percent to 30 percent more than food stamp benefits to purchase a minimally adequate diet.
Journalists and members of Congress who have taken the “food stamp challenge” and attempted to live on the benefit for a week have shared their experiences — the difficulties in planning, mood swings and general fatigue. Imagine a child going through the same thing, except it’s not a “challenge.” It’s a way of life.
In the context of the recession, economists from both the left and right agree that the single best stimulus is food stamps because people spend them so quickly. Extended unemployment benefits are also necessary, but food stamps tend to be more helpful than tax rebates. The Food Research and Action Center is pushing hard for a temporary boost, six to 18 months, to be put in the next stimulus package.
That’s step one. Next year, Congress is supposed to consider a periodic reauthorization of all major programs, including child nutrition programs — breakfast and lunch, summer after-school food and the WIC program for pregnant women, infants and toddlers. Included, as well, would be the program that pays for food at child care centers and family child care homes. These are several very important programs, not just to hunger alleviation but to childhood development.
Monies should be increased in these programs both to draw more children into the programs and to improve the use of healthful foods. School meals tend to be healthier than the food many children bring from home.
Moving forward, the goal is to make child nutrition programs better when Congress reconsiders them next year. The Department of Agriculture, Obama transition team and White House must start now if there is to be hope of ending childhood hunger by 2015 through further improvements in nutrition programs, a long-term increase in food stamps and jobs and income supports.
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