WASHINGTON, DC- U.S. Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) today urged his Senate colleagues to take action to end hunger as the Senate begins to debate the reauthorization of U.S. Child Nutrition Programs. Senator Casey participated in a hearing of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry entitled “Reauthorization of U.S. Child Nutrition Programs: Opportunities to Fight Hunger and Improve Child Health.”
Senator Casey has introduced a number of bills aimed at increasing access to critical nutrition programs for the nation’s most vulnerable children and families including: the Summer Food Service Rural Expansion Act to increase summer meals for students living in hard-to-reach rural areas; the Emergency Food Assistance Act to leverage the funding of food banks and the National Hunger Relief Act to help federal nutrition programs better keep pace with food cost increases. Senator Casey also introduced legislation to use the innovative Philadelphia universal school meals program model as a national program to feed children, reduce bureaucracy and save money by creating alternatives to the standard paper application process and meal claiming procedures for schools serving concentrations of low-income children during breakfast and lunch.
Senator Casey’s opening statement follows below.
Agriculture Committee Hearing
Opening Statement on Child Nutrition
Senator Robert P. Casey, Jr.
November 17, 2009
Hunger exacts serious tolls on the health and development of children and is associated with poor health, behavioral problems and developmental problems. Federal nutrition programs not only reduce hunger, they reduce poverty, prevent obesity, strengthen schools and child care programs and boost children's health, development and school achievement.
Ending hunger remains one of my top priorities as it cuts across all of the major challenges we are facing, including preventive health care, quality of life for families and the ability of children to take full advantage of educational opportunities.
I applaud President Obama’s commitment to end hunger in America by 2015. This aggressive goal is both achievable and necessary if we are to truly bring change to lives of vulnerable families living in Pennsylvania and every state.
USDA's Economic Research Service yesterday released its annual report on Household Food Security in the U.S., which revealed figures that represent the highest level of food insecurity observed since nationally representative food security surveys were initiated in 1995. In 2008, 16.7 million (22.5 percent) children are living in food insecure households compared to 12.4 million (16.9 percent) in 2007. In 2008, 49.1 million (16.4 percent) Americans lived in food insecure households, compared to 36.2 million (12.2 percent) in 2007. The number of individuals who are food insecure increased 36 percent over 2007 and the number of children increased 35 percent over 2007.
Even when resources are inadequate to provide food for the entire family, children are usually shielded from the disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake that characterize very low food security. However, children as well as adults experienced instances of very low food security in 506,000 households (1.3 percent of households with children) in 2008, up from 323,000 households (0.8 percent of households with children) in 2007.
The fundamental cause of food insecurity and hunger in the United States is poverty - marked by a lack of adequate resources to address basic needs such as food, shelter and health care. In Pennsylvania, 15.8 percent of children (439,153, almost half a million) were food insecure from 2005-2007, according to Feeding America, using USDA and other government statistics.
While USDA was releasing its study on food insecurity yesterday, I launched a tour across Pennsylvania for the exhibit Witnesses to Hunger, a photography project documenting hunger and poverty in Philadelphia. This project began at Drexel University in Philadelphia with 40 women capturing their daily struggle with hunger with digital cameras. The project has been expanded to women in Scranton and will continue to expand to capture the universal struggle with hunger.
In May, I had the honor of bringing this exhibit to Washington. I cannot begin to describe how moved I was to see the photographs taken by these women and hear their stories.
Their bravery and rare courage in sharing the struggles they face to provide a safe, nurturing home for their children will always stay with me. These mothers who brought Witnesses to Hunger to life are a constant reminder that the programs we in Congress advocate for, and the new initiatives we develop, can have a real impact on people’s lives.
Too often in Washington, we are guilty of seeing the world in terms of sound bites, policy summaries and numbers. We know that well-fed, healthy kids are the lynchpin to many of the other big policy issues dealing with healthcare, education and the economy. The kids in school right now will be the workforce that will help us build new industries and jobs and transform our economy.
We need to invest in our children’s future. Children who are hungry and malnourished cannot take full advantage of the educational opportunities presented to them. We need to ensure that our children will be able to take full advantage of the opportunities that come their way later in life. We need to make a real difference in the lives of American families.
I have introduced a number of bills aimed at increasing access to critical nutrition programs for the nation’s most vulnerable children and families including: the Summer Food Service Rural Expansion Act to increase summer meals for students living in hard-to-reach rural areas; the Emergency Food Assistance Act to leverage the funding of food banks and the National Hunger Relief Act to help federal nutrition programs better keep pace with food cost increases.
Beyond increased access to food, I also support increased access to quality nutritious foods. I believe that proper nutrition is preventive health care and it is especially important to the growth and development of children. For this reason, I co-sponsored the Child Nutrition Promotion and School Lunch Protection Act to ensure that vending machines do not undermine the balanced nutrition provided to kids in school lunch.
I have also introduced legislation, with my colleague on the committee Senator Bennet, to use the innovative Philadelphia universal school meals program model as a national program to feed children, reduce bureaucracy and save money. The bill creates alternatives to the standard paper application process and meal claiming procedures for schools serving concentrations of low-income children during breakfast and lunch. Specifically, the bill allows schools that agree to serve breakfast and lunch free to all students for five years to be reimbursed based on socioeconomic data rather than individual applications. The school gets administrative relief in exchange for covering any costs that exceed federal reimbursements. The current system is inefficient and outdated. The pilot program in Philadelphia illustrates how the successful modernization of feeding programs can ensure that students receive nutritious meals. I hope to bring the Philadelphia universal school meals program to the national level so that more children can benefit.
As it comes time to reauthorize the Child Nutrition Act, I remain committed to increasing access to school meals and nutrition education for school children.
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