Hunger Relief from the Ground Up: Secret is in the Soil
June 20, 2018 • Patricia Brady
At the end of March, Gaining Ground hosted an interdisciplinary panel focused on the issue of hunger relief. In a community like ours, hunger might not be obvious, but here are the numbers:
- 41 million Americans are hungry, and yet 40% of food in the US is thrown away during the growing, distribution, and dining process.
- Children struggle with hunger with 1 in 8 children in Eastern MA being food insecure and 1 in 6, nationally.
- 800,000 Massachusetts residents do not know where their next meal will come from, an increase of 71% in the last decade.
Our panel included:
- Danielle Nierenberg, activist, author, and journalist who co-founded Food Tank, a non-profit organization that researches food systems, hunger, and poverty.
- Dr. Kathryn Brodowski, preventive medicine physician who specializes in food insecurity and nutrition. She oversees both program and research at The GBFB.
- Doug Wolcik, farm manager at Gaining Ground. Doug has focused on soil health and introduced no-till agricultural practices to Gaining Ground, a switch that has vastly increased the amount of food the organization is able to donate to hunger relief efforts.
We had a full crowd join us for an evening of discussion about food security, human health and one of the most surprising levers for positive change: the soil beneath our feet. Read on for the full story by Patricia Brady.