As part of our 2018 Public Policy Priorities, Rise Against Hunger supports the preservation and expansion of resources for policies and programs that promote food security around the world.
These resources include U.S. federal government spending as well as funding from other countries and international organizations. In the United States, a primary resource for international food security resources is the International Affairs Budget, which is approved through the annual Congressional appropriations process.
Each year, the budget process begins when the White House releases its budget recommendations. Congress is not obligated to follow these recommendations, but they serve to indicate the administration’s priorities for spending for the next year.
On February 12, the White House released its budget recommendations for FY 2019 and the recommendations propose a 30% cut to the International Affairs Budget from the previous year’s levels.
While proposed cuts are not unusual, organizations and individuals that care about poverty-focused development and humanitarian programs must work to ensure more robust funding.
Rise Against Hunger has joined with InterAction, an alliance of nongovernmental organizations, and over 120 international non-profit organizations to recommend the International Affairs Budget be fully funded at least $59.1 billion.
Rise Against Hunger is advocating for full funding of the International Affairs Budget because of the crucial work this funding supports. U.S. investments have have been instrumental in creating healthier, safer and more stable societies. Some of these impacts include the near eradication of polio, cutting in half the number of preventable deaths of children under age five, significantly reducing the number of people living in poverty and notably increasing the number of children and adolescents in school.
Crucial to Rise Against Hunger’s mission, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) programming has ended hunger for 1.7 million households in the past five years.
These poverty-focused development and humanitarian assistance programs are less than one percent of the total U.S. federal budget and help to leverage $15 billion of private investment, while helping to build sustainability, fight disease, respond to disasters, improve global health and nutrition, support democracy and good governance and much more.
American engagement poverty-focused development and humanitarian assistance matters and is closely tied to Rise Against Hunger’s mission to end hunger by 2030.
To find out more about Rise Against Hunger’s Advocacy efforts, sign up to be a Hunger Champion and join us as we raise our voices to end hunger.