wfn.org | Ending hunger one step at a time: CROP Hunger Walk season opens

[George Conklin <gconklin@igc.org>]

Ending hunger one step at a time: CROP Hunger Walk season opens

NEW YORK, September 16, 2009-- September marks the opening of the 
40th season of CROP Hunger Walks, sponsored by humanitarian agency 
Church World Service.  The walks make up a nationwide network of 
Church World Service hunger fighting walks in which some 2,000 U.S. 
communities participate throughout the year.

The hunger walks are a time when congregations and communities join 
friends, families, and neighbors to raise money and walk together to 
show their concern for people who don't have enough to eat.

This year's CROP Hunger Walks, with the theme "Enough for All," take 
on added significance as people in the United States and abroad face 
increasing joblessness and hunger in an ailing global economy.  Some 
newly hungry people are eating meals from soup kitchens or food 
pantries for the first time in their lives.

CROP Hunger Walkers collectively raise some $16 million a year from 
the individuals, organizations and local businesses that sponsor 
them.  The reach of those donations is both local and global: A 
portion of the funds might be used to help feed a needy family right 
in your neighborhood.  Some might help provide a feeding program or 
agricultural support so that an impoverished family in a village in 
Indonesia or Nicaragua or the Dominican Republic can nourish a starving child.

In June, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 
announced that hunger is projected to reach a historic high in 2009, 
with more than 1.02 billion people going hungry.  FAO's complete 2009 
hunger report will be released in October.

Hunger is more than just temporary discomfort caused by lack of 
food.  It increases susceptibility to disease.  It hinders learning 
by not providing children with adequate nutrition.  It also leaves 
its victims too weak to work, thereby plunging families deeper into poverty.

Church World Service CROP Hunger Walks give people who care a way to 
express their concern through action; a way to help people whose 
names they may never know, even as they help feed people who may be 
hungry right next door.

The problem is massive but it is not insurmountable.

This September, as the United States observes Hunger Action Month, 
CWS is asking people throughout the nation to become CROP Hunger 
Walkers, to support a CROP Hunger Walker in their communities or to 
donate online at www.cropwalkonline.org.

Call your CWS/CROP Regional Office, toll-free at 888-297-2767 or 
visit www.cropwalk.org to find the CROP Hunger Walk nearest you or to 
learn how to organize one.

Media Contacts:

Lesley Crosson, (212) 870-2676, media@churchworldservice.org
Jan Dragin, 24/7, (781) 925-1526, jdragin@gis.net