MARIA CHRISTINE A. SAPLALA
This Christmas, as we celebrate the season of giving, let’s embrace a more inclusive approach and extend our care to bridge the gap between the rich and poor. Our mission is to empower the less fortunate, ensuring every family has sustainable access to nutritious food and healthier lives.
Nurturing a Zero Hunger and Zero Poverty World:
Our journey toward a Hunger and poverty-free future is guided by inclusion, generosity, and shared responsibility. We can make this journey tangible and transformative through the following:
1. Inclusion for All – The Gift of Unity:
Let’s remember that inclusion means leaving no one behind. The Kusina ng Kalinga+ program starts Magtulungan – connecting individuals, communities, and institutions (corporate sponsors, civil society, and the government) transcending boundaries to help eradicate Hunger.
For instance, KNK+ Marawi, a central kitchen collaboration between local and international partners like Seafood City Supermarket through GK USA, Fr. Ben Nebres, SJ, the Department of Education-BARMM, and the local Muslim Community, continues to make a profound impact, leaving no one excluded from a better future.
2. Supplemental Feeding – The Gift of Nutrition:
One essential step towards Zero Hunger is Magpakain, which provides nutritious meals for vulnerable members, especially children, pregnant and lactating women, and seniors. Stories like Hafsah’s and the Villanueva Siblings in Arakan show the positive impact of KNK+.
Hafsah Hadji Rasul, an 11-year-old Maranao beneficiary of KNK+ Marawi, who wishes to be a nurse someday to help his parents and those who are sick, shared that he learned to eat vegetables to become healthier through supplemental feeding.
The Villanueva Siblings benefit from the vegetable-based meals prepared by volunteers at the KNK+ central kitchen in Kabalantian, Arakan, North Cotabato. Kabalantian is a barangay with the highest number of malnourished children, mostly from farming families whose parents spend long hours tending their crops of rice, corn, banana, or rubber trees. After 120 days of feeding, the four sisters, Andrea, Grace, Kyle, and Isabel, improved their Body Mass Index (BMI) status.
As we gather for our Christmas feasts, remember those who may not have enough to eat. Let our acts of giving extend beyond the holiday season, ensuring that nutritious meals reach those who need them throughout the year.
3. Health and Nutrition Education – The Gift of Knowledge:
Feeding alone won’t eliminate Hunger. Empowering families on the ground with knowledge about nutrition and healthy lifestyles is crucial. Community-based Magpakalusog programs, like KNK+ Bacnotan, help parents support their children’s health. In KNK+ Bacnotan, La Union, more than 20 families joined the 21-day Challenge for their Magpakalusog Program. For 21 days, the families prepared the same nutritious, budget-friendly recipe daily and then ate together. They took pictures and shared them with the other challenger families in the social media group.
This Christmas, let us also consider contributing a gift that keeps giving. Share a gift of knowledge that will empower families to make informed choices about nutrition and healthy lifestyles.
4. Community Food Farming – The Gift of Sustainability:
With the rising prices, low-income families resort to coping mechanisms like substituting affordable but less healthy food, but if they have community vegetable gardens, they may not have to. Community gardens ensure self-sufficiency and pride for needy communities. They offer a sustainable source of nutritious ingredients and opportunities to augment income by selling excess produce.
The Marawi Community Food Farm has gained local support from a local coffee shop, Altitude Café, which orders fresh, organically grown lemongrass and its other vegetable produce.
Volunteers at the Arakan Community Food Farm shared that they spent hours planting vegetables like okra, alugbati, upo, ampalaya, and chili and raising chickens and goats. Still, the hands-on training in proper vegetable growing while making friends made it worth the sacrifices. Some even pay it forward by mentoring their next-door neighbors in backyard gardening.
As we exchange gifts during Christmas, let us remember the gift of sustainability. Just as Christmas gifts bring joy, the community gardens bring sustenance and pride to needy communities.
5. Online Platforms for Zero Hunger – The Gift of Global Connection:
Hunger is a vast issue that requires a broad network. This Christmas, let’s use social media for social change and inspire others to join the movement to eradicate Hunger.
Join the Zero Hunger Alliance: – The Gift of Hope:
Consider joining the Zero Hunger Alliance as your gift of hope to the Philippines. Imagine a country with Zero Hunger Communities established one partnership, meal, and empowered community at a time. Every step forward counts on the road to a hunger-free Philippines. Together, we can make the dream of Zero Hunger a Christmas promise, a gift of caring, and a legacy of sharing.
