Dear Future President,

Food insecurity is the state of being without reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food. This is what’s happening to millions of families across our country. I strongly believe that people who suffer from food insecurity shouldn’t suffer anymore. We all know what it means, but some of us don’t know what to do about it. I know what i’m doing because I help donate food to our local food bank with a club at my school. I know what I’m doing to help, but here’s the big question: What are you going to do to help end food insecurity?

One of the effects of food insecurity is there are millions of families in the U.S that are living with food insecurity everyday of their lives. I found out that there are more than 42.2 million people who suffer from food insecurity. We need to tackle this problem now because by sitting around we are letting more families go hungry. According to the USDA Food and Nutrition Service, they have been doing everything they can to inform people about this major issue. They are doing the right thing because they are letting Americans know about the issue. In an article by Mark Nord for Food Research and Action Center, between 35 and 40 percent of households with very low food security have an adult with a disability in the household. If these families have parents with disabilities, then we need to do something to help them because the parents aren’t going to be able to do anything to help provide for their families.

Another bad effect of food insecurity is major health problems for children. Mark Nord stated it can cause a slow development in the child’s growth. Do we really want a child to experience that? People in America are going to be depending on you to help pay for their health care. Mark Nord also stated that food insecurity affects a person psychically and biophysically. Citizens could be experiencing really bad problems from that effect, and that isn’t right. It could also be because of the housing, healthcare, or neighborhood the family lives in. It’s not right that people are trying to provide for their families, and we aren’t do anything about it.

Another difficulty with food insecurity is that it’s already bad for millions of people with food insecurity. It is even worse for others with food insecurity. According to Feeding America, 6.3 million households experienced very low food insecurity in 2015. This problem isn’t looking too good because this means millions of families are still suffering from low food security. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), in 2015, 13.1 million children under the age of 18 in the United States lived in households where they were unable to consistently access enough nutritious food necessary for a healthy life. If that happened to 13.1 million children in 2015, imagine how many children are suffering from food insecurity this year! Feeding America stated that Mississippi has the highest food insecure rate in the country at 20.8%. It may be bad for other states in the country, but Mississippi has the worst food insecure rate. Even though that people have bad experiences with food insecurity, they need to have faith and hope!

Others think that people with food insecurity depend too much on the Food Banks as a food source for their families. We need to focus on the families who severely suffer from food insecurity. Some people can’t afford to pay for food every night. Others think that the food bank is being ran dry because of people with food insecurity. What they don’t realize is that it's hard to provide for your family when you’re very poor. Food just doesn’t pop out of thin air, people have to buy it from the money they earn from working. That isn’t possible for a lot of people in this country. I am on the side of helping people with food insecurity, not the other way around.

“In a world of plenty, no one, not a single person, should go hungry. But almost 1 billion still do not have enough to eat. I want to see an end to hunger everywhere within my lifetime.”– Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General. We must stop food insecurity before it causes more tragic problems for this country. This should be your top priority!!!!

Sincerely,

Abby F