Articles by Liz Joyce

Liz has written 3 articles on the WhyHunger Connect Blog.

Liz Joyce

Farm Bill Update: National Call-In Day

, June 14, 2013

tagged as , , ,

Cuts to nutrition assistance for struggling families are unacceptable. You can help: Here’s the latest Farm Bill action from our friends at Half in Ten.

Urge your member of Congress not to cut nutrition assistance!

Funding for supplemental nutrition assistance—a vital support for low-income families and children—is on the chopping block. Next week the House of Representatives will debate the Farm Bill, which includes nearly $21 billion in catastrophic cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (formerly food stamps), causing millions of low-income children and families struggling with hunger to see their food assistance cut, or to lose their benefits entirely—a loss of 8 billion meals.

We must take action. We cannot let this happen.

Here are two ways you can take action:

  1. On Tuesday, June 18, is a National Call-In Day. Call your Member of Congress to express your opposition to the Farm Bill and the $20.5 billion in cuts to SNAP. Call the toll-free hotline at 866.527.1087 to be connected to your Member of Congress.
  2. Send an email to your member of Congress telling them that cuts to SNAP are unacceptable.

The House Farm Bill will:

  • Cause 2 million individuals to lose their SNAP benefits entirely
  • Cause 210,000 children to lose access to free school meals
  • Cause 850,000 households to see their benefits cut by an average of $90 per month
  • Slash nutrition-education funding, which helps low-income families stretch limited resources to maximize nutrition

Sample tweet:

Take action and contact your Representative today: House Farm Bill proposing $21 billion in SNAP cuts is unacceptable! http://bit.ly/10ie636 @HalfinTen

We need your help to take action to help families put food on the table. Now is the time to stand up for vulnerable families!

{ 0 comments }

Your Burgers May be Square, But Your Food Ain’t Fair

, May 23, 2013

tagged as

Last Saturday, upwards of 300 New Yorkers joined Florida farmworker organization the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) for a march through Manhattan to demand that Wendy’s join the CIW’s innovative Fair Food Program. The program is a collaboration between Florida’s tomato growers, major retailers, and farmworkers, ensuring the human rights and dignity of farmworkers through guarantees of basic rights such as payment for time worked, access to water, shade, and bathrooms in the fields, and the right to work free from sexual harassment. McDonald’s, Burger King, Taco Bell, and eight other major fast food corporations and food companies have signed onto the Fair Food Agreement, which has begun to dramatically change the lives of farmworkers in Florida’s tomato fields. Wendy’s continues to hold out, but hopefully the CIW’s presence in New York this week will help the company decide to do the right thing.

Before starting Saturday’s march, CIW members and allies dramatized the Coalition’s journey thus far through a powerful and often very funny theater piece featuring some well-known characters. Check out this slideshow to see the story for yourself!

◄ Back
Picture 1 of 6

Workers in the fields suffer abuses and harassment from their boss (the man here in yellow) –leading to the formation of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the subsequent quest to demand companies source their tomatoes responsibly.

Some of our favorite moments from Saturday’s march:

{ 0 comments }

Snapshots from the Field: Visit to MPP in Haiti

, June 15, 2012

tagged as

by Debbie Grunbaum, Director of Communications

WhyHunger’s Imagine There’s No Hunger campaign, in partnership with Hard Rock International and Yoko Ono Lennon, works with 26 grassroots organizations in 15 countries to address the immediate needs of childhood hunger and support long-term, sustainable solutions to rebuild local food economies.   On the ground in Haiti, our Imagine partners at Mouvman Peyizan Papay (Peasant Movement of Papaye), or MPP, are working with over 60,000 peasant farmers to reshape Haiti’s food economy and ensure that everyone has the right to good food.  On a recent visit to the Central Plateau, where MPP has its headquarters, we learned that this movement is not only taking shape in the fields, but also in the schools.

The demand for healthier, locally-grown school food is heating up across the United States and some amazing WhyHunger partners are leading the change from the grassroots up.  This week, we want to share a snapshot of school food in Haiti, brought to you by MPP.

 

Through a partnership with MPP, students at the National School of Bassin Zim in Haiti's Central Plateau are now getting the nutrients and energy needed to learn. MPP’s agroecologists have been working with the administration, parents and community at Bassin Zim to build their capacity to successfully run a school-based sustainable agriculture program through training, technical assistance and support. (Photo: WhyHunger)

MPP founder and president, Chavannes Jean-Baptiste, demonstrates the newly built, Imagine-funded water cistern that has allowed the agriculture program at the Bassin Zim school to flourish, providing healthy meals for their more than 500 students. (Photo: Hazel Thompson)

John Galloway, Chief Marketing Officer and Vice President of Hard Rock Cafe International, works with parents and community members to prepare the fields for the season at the National School of Bassin Zim. (Photo: Hazel Thompson)

Students enjoy lunch at another local school, in Californe, Haiti, where MPP has just begun a similar agroecology program to harvest the surrounding fields to ensure that every child gets a healthy meal during the day. (Photo: Hazel Thompson)

And don’t forget the mangos! Found in abundance around Haiti’s rich Central Plateau, mangoes offer a healthy but sweet addition to any meal – especially for this toddler in Californe! (Photo: WhyHunger)

{ 0 comments }