In May, President Joe Biden announced a goal to end hunger by 2030, an ambitious goal to achieve in eight years. The White House officially released the president’s five pillar plan to achieve this goal.
How serious is food insecurity and hunger in the U.S.?
According to The Guardian, 1 in 10 families struggled with food insecurity in 2021, which is an extreme statistic, considering the United States is one of the richest countries in the world. However, even while being a wealthy country, the U.S. has a vast wealth gap.
In addition to prevalent hunger, the country is seeing an urgent nutrition health crisis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that about one-half of adults in the U.S. suffer from a “diet-related chronic disease.” Some of these diseases include Type 2 diabetes, obesity, hypertension and cardiovascular disease.
Biden’s administration believes that hunger and diet-related diseases can be prevented through a plan to prioritize health in the nation.
What is President Biden’s plan to end hunger?
The Biden-Harris administration plans to tackle this issue in five ways:
- Improve access and affordability of food by improving school meals and expanding benefits — such as Summer Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) — to more underserved populations.
- Expanding Medicaid and Medicare to include more nutrition and health education.
- Making proposals to improve food labeling and reducing sodium in food supplies, and attempting to reduce sugar consumption to help consumers make healthier choices.
- Expanding the CDC Physical Activity and Nutrition Program, facilitating efforts to connect people to parks and the outdoors to support physical activity for all.
- Funding more research for nutrition and food security and advancing nutritional science.
More details of the plan can be found in the strategy, which was released on Tuesday.
How much will the plan cost?
More than $8 billion in private and public sectors will go towards Biden’s initiatives, according to NBC News. Here is how the money will be divided to fund the president’s plan:
- $2.5 billion to startup companies that are dedicated to finding food insecurity and hunger solutions.
- Over $4 billion toward philanthropy efforts to enhance access to healthy foods and increased physical activity.
- According to U.S. News & World Report, $250 million was pledged to go towards free and healthy school meals.
- $200 million to charities and food banks.