Why give to the Texas Baptist Offering for World Hunger?

A few brief stories illustrate the need:

Famine has devastated Malawi, Africa. In the Dowa District, people are feeding themselves by digging up plants and eating the leaves and roots, sometimes with disastrous consequences.

In Nauchi Village, a mother and child were poisoned by neighbors who were intent on stealing the small amount of food the mother had in her possession.

In many villages across Malawi, children are running away to larger towns in the hope of begging for food on the streets.

The fundamental cause of hunger is poverty. One out of five people on earth exists on less than $1 per day, and half the world’s population exists on less than $2 per day. Ninety-five percent of these “poorest of the poor” live in the developing world.

Virtually every country in the world has the potential of growing sufficient food for the indigenous population on a sustainable basis. This basic capability is too often undermined by a variety of factors, some related to technology and material resources (soil degradation, water shortages and pollution, inappropriate or destructive agricultural practices) and others related to human frailty (war, ethnic rivalry, corruption, greed, political oppression).

More than 30,000 children die every day in the developing world from preventable and treatable diseases such as diarrhea, acute respiratory infections, measles and malaria. Most of these deaths are hunger-related, since the diseases are far more deadly to children whose health has been compromised by malnutrition. Worldwide, one-half of deaths for children under 5 years of age are caused by malnutrition. Seventy percent of all childhood deaths are associated with malnutrition and preventable diseases.

Malnutrition severely affects both physical and intellectual development. Most children who survive severe malnutrition suffer some form of irreversible brain damage and/or stunted growth.

In many places around the world, water is a commodity in as critically short supply as food. While global population has tripled since 1930, water use has increased six-fold. Twelve million people die each year from water-related issues, including 3 million children from water-borne diseases.

Of the world’s 6.3 billion people, 1.1 billion lack access to clean water, 2.4 billion live without decent sanitation and 4 billion live without wastewater disposal. In developing countries, more than 90 percent of sewage and 70 percent of industrial wastes are dumped untreated into surface waters, polluting the water supply.

But hunger does not stop at America’s borders, either.

Nearly 34 million Americans, including almost 13 million children, make up the 10 percent of U.S. households that regularly experience hunger or the risk of hunger.

People in these households miss meals, eat too little, have low quality diets or regularly seek emergency food assistance because they do not have the money to purchase the food they need. The child poverty rate in the United States is more than double that of any other industrialized nation.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors has reported a 19 percent increase in requests for emergency food assistance over the past year. Just over half the cities surveyed in the mayors’ report said they are not able to provide an adequate quantity of food to those in need.

America’s Second Harvest, the nation’s largest food bank network, found that 23.3 million people sought and received emergency hunger relief through the Second Harvest network in 2001. This number is roughly equivalent to the combined populations of the 10 largest U.S. cities—New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, San Diego, Phoenix, San Antonio, Dallas and Detroit.

Of the 50 states, only one state has a higher percentage of families experiencing food insecurity and hunger than Texas. Nearly one out of six Texans lives in poverty, and Texans in poverty constitute one-tenth of the nation’s entire poverty population.

The Texas poverty rate for children of all ages and for senior adults is significantly higher (at least 25 percent higher in every age category) than the national average. The poverty rate for African-Americans and Hispanics in Texas is three times the rate for Anglos.

In cities and towns along the Texas-Mexico border, one out of three residents lives in poverty. In certain areas along the border, more than half the child and adolescent population is poor. The poverty rate for Hidalgo, Cameron and Webb counties is three times the rate for Dallas county.

One out of 10 children under 12 years of age in Texas is hungry. Nearly a third of Texas’ children are hungry or at risk of hunger. These children miss meals, eat too little, have low quality diets or live in households that regularly seek emergency food assistance because they do not have the money to purchase the food they need.

Contrary to popular perception, most poor people are working people. The vast majority of poor families in Texas include at least one working adult. More than 80 percent of poor families with children and nearly 60 percent of poor families and individuals without children had one or more adults who worked at some point in the year.

Almost half of working poor families in Texas include a full-time, year-round worker. Even though many of the working poor labor long hours, low wages do not allow these families to escape poverty.