[av_one_full first min_height=” vertical_alignment=” space=” custom_margin=” margin=’0px’ padding=’0px’ border=” border_color=” radius=’0px’ background_color=” src=” background_position=’top left’ background_repeat=’no-repeat’ animation=”]
[av_heading heading=’Groups: Let’s end hunger’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”][/av_heading]
[av_textblock size=” font_color=” color=”]
CEBU City – More than a hundred local and national organizations have launched a nationwide campaign to end hunger.
It aims to urge the Duterte administration to give more attention to hunger issues, said a leader of one of the initiating organizations.
If the administration gives as much attention to hunger as it does to illegal drugs, Filipinos experiencing lack of food will be in better conditions, said Pamela Baricuatro, executive director of SimplyShare Foundation, Inc.
In a forum at the University of San Carlos – Talamban campus on Nov. 16, organizers started a series of activities related to the “Philippine Initiative for Zero Hunger”, which also seeks the passage of a law creating the Zero Hunger Commission.
Hunger is a serious health concern, the Manila-based Stop Hunger Now Philippines (SHNP) said, citing a 2013 report that linked 31,000 deaths among children under 5 years old to being underweight due to malnutrition.
Filipinos experiencing hunger have increased in number over the last 15 years, too, according to the SHNP. A Social Weather Stations report found 18.3 percent, or around 21 million Filipinos, claimed to have experienced hunger in 2014, a huge increase from 8.3 percent in 1999, it noted.
In contrast, the SHNP said, other countries in the Asean region saw a reduction in the chronologically hungry. Hunger rate in Laos dropped 9.2 percent; Vietnam, 75.1 percent; Indonesia, 43.8 percent; Thailand, 79.8 percent; and Cambodia, 37.8 percent, it said. (Peace Process Media Bureau, PIA/PN)
[/av_textblock]
[/av_one_full]
